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FACE-OFF ALONG THE DMZ

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Wilaversos0 ‘Three Long Years in Korea

‘As Sherman tanks rumble in the back- ‘ground, US. Marines advance through the streets during the liberation of Seoul

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NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

GILBERT M. GROSVENOR, CHAIRMAN JOHN M. FAHEY, JR., PRESIDENT AND CEO WILLIAM L. ALLEN, EDITOR IN CHIEF, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE. ALLEN CARROLL, CHIEF CARTOGRAPHER

Washington, D.C., July 2003

di June 25—September 14, 1950

ORTH KOREA INVADES

In a bold effort to unify the country by force, North Korea staged a surprise invasion of the South on June 25, 1950, In just three days the attackers occupied the South's capital city, Seoul, and soon penetrated even farther below the 38th parallel, The UN responded by establishing a U.S.-led coalition to repel the invaders. In July U.S. ground troops joined South Korean forces fighting near Osan. By late summer the Coalition forces had retreated to a fraction of the peninsula that came to be called the Pusan Perimeter, centered around the port city of Pusan. This port became a lifeline through which flowed the men and supplies needed for a counteroffensive,

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4 f 38 November 25, 1950—January 24, (951 ‘ oO

HINA ON THE OFFENSIVE

The Chinese viewed the UN drive northward as a grave threat to the security of their country, By November 25 some 300,000 Chinese troops had entered the war in sup- port of North Korea. In late December, after savage fighting in bitter winter weather, the last of the UN troops withdrew below the 38th parallel. On the last day of the year, North Korean and Chinese communist troops—more than half a million strong— mustered for a second invasion of South Korea. Though they penetrated well below ‘the 38th parallel by late January, they were unable to sustain the offensive because of inadequacies in their own supply system— and relentless UN air and artillery fire.

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“No division of a nation in the present world is so astonishing in its origin as the division of Korea.”

k 1945 as World War II wound down, two U.S. Army colonels got a rush assignment: Draw a line through Korea dividing it into temporary occupation zones where the United States and Soviet Union would accept the surrender of Japanese forces. Poring over a map, they chose the 38th parallel. The Soviets agreed. This arbitrary line soon became entrenched, leaving each half of Korea fated to become a Cold War pawn. In 1948 the two Korean republics officially were born. Friction between the communist North and Western-allied South erupted into war when North Korea invaded in 1950. For three years the North, with Soviet backing and Chinese troops, fought a U.S.-led coalition of UN forces supporting the South. Each side gained and lost ground in battles to control the strategic peninsula. The cost: more than three million casualties by some estimates. Fifty years after the armistice that established the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) redividing North and South, the two Koreas remain technically at war, locked in an unending stalemate.

— Gregory Henderson, Korea scholar

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FOREIGN PENETRATION

With Chinese help the kingdom of Silla uni- fied much of what is now the Korean pen- insula in a.v. 668. In the early tenth century a leader named Wang Kon founded the kingdom of Koryo, root of the word “Korea.” For the next ten centuries Korea was essen- tially a unified nation despite invasions by Mongols, Japanese, and Manchus. Compe- tition between China and Japan for domina- tion of Korea led to the Sino-Japanese War of 1894-95. The Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05 ended with Korea as a Japanese protectorate. In 1910 Japan annexed the peninsula as a colony, a harsh domination that ended only with Japan's surrender to Allied forces in 1945. Korean euphoria at liberation turned to dismay when the coun- ty split into two quarreling halves.

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—yy UN attacks forced communist — ly troops north of the 38th parallel. MacArthur advocated driving the ‘communists from the peninsula and expanding the war into China. President Harry Truman disagreed, promoting a policy of contain- ment. MacArthur's public criti- cism of that policy caused him to be recalled from his command in

Ridge,

April 1951. Truce talks began on July 10, but fighting continued during two years of negotiations. Reports of camage came from such famous sites as Heartbreak

Ridge. On July 27, 1953, repre- sentatives of the UN, North Korea, and China finally signed an armi- stice; South Korea never signed.

'UN forces land October 29

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‘Supplement to NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, July 2003

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repressed by the Jape nese, South Koreans still celebrate March 1 and

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‘Becomes Republi ‘of Korea (ROK)

ber 15—November 24, 1950

RTH TO THE YALU

In an audacious gamble, UN troops commanded by U.S, Gen, Douglas MacArthur made an amphibious landing at the coastal city of Inchon on Sep- 42° tember 15. From there they moved on to recapture Seoul, cutting North Korea's communi- cation and supply lines, In early October, MacArthur called for immediate surrender by North Korea, a demand rejected by its

leader, Kim II Sung. At the same time, UN forces crossed the 38th parallel and began to move north toward the Yalu River on China's border (a move that, as China had threatened, led it to enter the war against the South). On October 19 UN troops took North Korea's capital, Pyongyang. Mac- Arthur claimed the troops might be “home by Christmas." It was a wildly optimistic prediction,

October 1950

US. Army paratroopers land in North Korea near the Chinese border in an offensive directed by Gen, Douglas Macarthur

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« November 1950. South Korean military police escort a Chinese prisoner, The capture of such soldiars confirmed that the Chinese had

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FORCES IN KOREA

Participants Forces Combat Deaths:

North Korea 260,000 214,899 China 2,300,000 401,401

39° TOTAL 2,560,000 616,300 United Nations.

‘Com 2,282 304 300 99 6.146 309 1/068 440 = i271 424 va aur, TOM 1119 (288 12634 Bis 120

Luxembourg 44 2

New Zealand 1,389 31

Philippines 1.496 412 aig Sly. Summer Reseach: rite L. French Pata A

Healy Ect Maureen J. Pym, Michael Horner, Davi B. Miler GIS, Jan. Morris, Watanachai Tadd Nirundor

South Africa 826 arity Robertson, Producti John 5 Bally, Debbie J Gibbons, Dianne

South Korea 590,911 Thalland 1,294

hey 5.455 741. United Kingdom 14,198 722

United States 302,483 TOTAL 932,964

Figures vary according to sources

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In all roughly 2.5 million Koreans were killed, wounded, or reported missing; over 33,000 Americans and some 3,000 other UN forces died, and an estimated 900,000 Chinese were killed or injured. After three years of war, the dividing line between the two sides ended up essentially where it began—along the 38th parallel.

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ANGST July 28, 1{953—Present

ENTRENCHED DIVISION

The postwar years have brought less than perfect peace. Since the armistice was signed in 1953, some 1,400 people have died in clashes between the two Koreas near the DMZ. Most recently, six perished in a sea battle on June 29, 2002. Internal strife also bloodies the land. In 1980 in the South Korean city of Gwangju, government troops killed hundreds—perhaps thousands—of people protesting martial law. Today, grow- ing numbers of Koreans want a thaw in rela- tions and eventual reunification, But with Pyongyang reactivating its nuclear program and North Korean leader Kim Jong II verbally threatening the U.S.—South Korea's ally— the world watches, fearful that regional ten- sions could turn into another deadly conflict.

For information regarding avallable maps call toll free 1-800-962-1643 or write to National Geographic Maps, PO Box 4357, Evergreen, CO 80437-4357.

You can reach us on the Internet at nationalgeographic.com,

‘Supplement to NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC, July 2003,

“The Cold War was more frigid here than > anywhere else in the world.”

—Bruce Cumings, Korea historian

thaw has begun as North and South Korea try

new steps in their awkward diplomatic waltz. In 2000, after 47 years of uneasy truce, North Korean leader Kim Jong II and South Korean President Kim Dae Jung convened an inter-Korean summit. They agreed to economic cooperation, cultural exchanges, and cross-border visits for relatives separated by the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). These initiatives sprang rs from Kim Dae Jung’s Sunshine Policy of engagement with the North, endorsed by his successor, President Roh Moo-hyun. Yet acrimony between North Korea ¢ and the United States—South Korea’s strongest ally— ed complicates efforts for North-South reconciliation. Fs And as anti-Americanism flares among South Koreans

angered by a continued U.S. troop presence; President _/ Cy F,

Roh struggles to balance his nation’s 50-year U.S. we Et i io ONE PEOPLE SEVERED BY WAR Biosphere Reserve Pe DLE’ fF Descended from nomadic peoples out of north-

ance hepsi feunihed Korea. & Zh a ma west Asia, Koreans are among the most ethni-

cally homogeneous populations in the world. They share an ancient history and a common geography—making their abrupt division after the Korean War alll the more painful. At least two million family members are still separated by the DMZ. Despite steps toward opening that border, the two Koreas today stand worlds apart, with the highly insular North languishing as the South thrives. Since the war South Korea has swollen to 48 million people and shifted from 75 percent rural to 82 percent urban, with one in five people living in Seoul. Most Koreans, North or South, live along the peninsula's west- ern lowlands, one of the world's most densely populated—and riven—landscapes.

Produced by National Geographic Maps for National Geographic Magazine

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

GILBERT M, GROSVENOR, CHAIRMAN JOHN M. FAHEY, JR., PRESIDENT AND CEO WILLIAM L. ALLEN, EDITOR IN CHIEF, NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE ALLEN CARROLL, CHIEF CARTOGRAPHER

Washington, D.C., July 2003

Population Density Russa

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‘Smaller in area, the South has more than twice the population of the North, About 80 percent of ‘South Koreans were born after the Korean War.

ARMAMENTS PENINSULA ON EDGE

A huge amount of weaponry and manpower crowds the border between the two Koreas, North Korea's military—fifth largest in the

ra a al clashes, the ide

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the North and the U.S. soared last October mae af : when the U.S. presented evidence that North 5 Korea had started a program to enrich uranium, ’ ‘

which can be used in nuclear weapons. This effectively violated a 1994 pact in which North Korea pledged to abandon its nuclear program in exchange for energy assistance and oil. The U.S. immediately halted oil shipments. Soon thereafter North Korea expelled UN weapons

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NORTHERN FREE FALL, SOUTHERN MIRACLE

The DMZ has provided an unforeseen benefit: sanctuary for two rare species of Asi

‘cranes and other wildlife. ; inspectors and reopened its key nuclear facility === -Tochin____|____enwironmental groups hope to Mohan meets Soe sani CESS REI ARTGrIn nat: at Yongbyon. In January it withdrew from the the DMZ and some adjacent lands i Me ural resources like coal and iron ore, the North nuclear nonproliferation treaty, and in April Korea as a preserve. ‘ y

North Korea claimed that it already possessed nuclear weapons. The crisis leaves South Korea in a diplomatically treacherous position, juggling

its relations with the North and the U.S.—and

vulnerable to the crossfire of any conflict.

had more heavy industry than the agricultural South. But North Korea became stymied by its rigid centralized economy and entrenched policy of chuche, or self-reliance—economic suicide in today's global marketplace. Having lost its chief benefactor with the collapse of the Soviet Union, and hit hard by floods and drought in the 1990s, the North faces grim shortages of food, fuel, industrial equipment, and electrical power. ‘ Airforce bose The South, however, enjoys vigorous prosperity. {Army comps deployment Due in part to huge export-oriented conglomer-

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MILITARY FORCES AND SPENDING, 2002

NORTH KOREA | peeewen North and South Korea together include DDD 5.1 Re ‘mare than 3,000 islands, mast of them off Japan and South Korea are already vulnerable the southern and western coasts. The to North Korea's arsenal of mises, and some largest, Jeju-do, covers 700 square miles | analysts believe that North Korea is developing oe and counts 548,000 residents. 2 long-range missle that could reach the West

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‘Maintaining its armed forces costs North Korea nearly a third of its GDP. In times of scarcity, feeding and supplying the troops gets priority.

Main map base data: Ministry of National Defense (MND), Republic of Kore (ROK); Samsung SOS ‘Protected ares: UNEP World Conservation Monsaring Centre ulin deity nin lal opin aa Oak ge Nato Lara

ak Hong The Keeani: A Canpern ef Neth rd Seth Bank of Kore Mita rcs The tary Baaree 2002-2003 fers Roa) HIND, NOK (Sch Kee)

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Longitude East 191° of Greenwich ee

For information regarding avallable mans call toll free 1-800-962-1643 or write to National Geographic Maps,

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Dangerous Divide As North Korea steps up its nuclear threat, it’s business as usual along the DMZ—the narrow strip of land that has split the Korean peninsula for 50 years. There the two armies,

the South’s backed by 20,000 U.S. troops, wait for the other to blink.

BY TOM O'NEILL PHOTOGRAPHS BY MICHAEL YAMASHITA

Animal Attraction Males will do whatever it takes to win the mating game: sing, dance, fight a rival, build a house, give a gift. But in the end, it’s usually the females who do the choosing.

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The New Story of China’s Ancient Past A trove of artifacts has shattered China’s traditional story of its origins—

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From the Editor

LINK HARPER

hey call the Korean War the “Forgotten War,” but I never

forgot it. How could I? Fourteen years after the 1953 armi- stice, I was sent to Korea with the Second Infantry Divi- sion to serve along the Demilitarized Zone, or DMZ. When Geocrapuic began working on an article to mark the DMZ’ that time. I was surprised to find this faded photo of me at the fence

50th anniversary, I searched my basement for reminders of

_— line and my Imjin Scout badge (for 157 missions north of the Imjin River). The badge brought it all back: The tension. The cold. That brutal week in January ’68 when the U.S.S. Pueblo was seized. Days

earlier, 31 North Korean commandos bent on assas-

sinating South Korea’s president had sneaked across the DMZ and were spotted blocks from his residence in Seoul. Night merged into day as our patrols hunted them as they fled for the border, the flickering light of flares illuminating the darkness. In the end, one commando was captured, the rest killed. This month’s cover story shows that not much has changed. The fence line’s still there. The stare-downs still happen. And I still feel the bond between men who suffer winter nights and wade through summer mud. But there’s one big difference: These days, with the prospect of a nuclear North Korea, the stakes are even higher. @ Watch my preview of the August issue on National Geographic Today on July 17

at 7 p.m. and again at 10 p.m. (ET and PT) on the National Geographic Channel.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

WILLIAM L. ALLEN Editor in Chief

BERNARD OHANIAN, Associate Editor ROBERT L. BOOTH, Managing Editor

SENIOR EDITORS DON BELT, Geography and World Affairs DENNIS R. DIMICK, Environment WILLIAM T. DOUTHITT, Story Development JOHN A. ECHAVE, Research Grant Projects CHRIS JOHNS, Illustrations

KENT J. KOBERSTEEN, Photography

LISA MOORE LAROE, Staff Writers VALERIE A. MAY, New Media

PETER MILLER, Expeditions

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CONSTANCE H. PHELPS, Design

LESLEY B. ROGERS, Research CHRISTOPHER P. SLOAN, Art

EDITORIAL

Assistant Editors: Joe! K. Bourrie, Jr., Hillel J Hoffmann, Peter L. Porteous, Jane Vessels. Articles Editors: Lynn Addison, Michael Behar, Glenn Oeland, Barbara Paulsen, Jennifer Reek. Senior Writers: John L. Eliot, Alan Mairson, Cathy Newman. Tom O'Neill, Cliff Tarpy, Boris Weintraub, A. R. Williams, Margaret G. Zackowtz. Writers: Glenn Hodges, Jennifer Steinberg Holland, Michael Kiesius, Karen E. Lange. Lynne Warren, Research: David Brindley, Assoc. Director; Abigall A. Tipton, Asst. Director; Senior Researchers; Vietorla C, Ducheneaux, Alice J. Dunn, Patricia B. Kellogg, Kathy B. Maher, Barbara W, McConnell,

Mary McPeak, Jeanne E. Peters, David W. Wooddell, Researchers: Jennifer L. Fox, Nora Gallagher, Mary Jennings, Marisa J. Larson, Cathleen S. Lineberry, Nancie Majkowski, Robin A. Palmer, Heidi Schultz, Christy Ulirich. New Media: Cassandra Franklin Barbajosa, Senior Writer; Amanda MacEvitt, Producer, TV Liaison: Carol Kaufmann

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Photography: Susan A. Smith, Asst. Director; Photographers: William Albert Allard, Jodi Cobb, Michael Nichols, Mark Thiessen. Photo Engineering: Lawrence B. Maurer. Editors: Bert L. Fox, Todd James, Elizabeth Krist, Kathy Moran, Kurt F. Mutchler, Christopher Scaptura, Susan Welchman, Design: Robert Gray, David C. Whitmore, Asst. Directors; Elaine H, Bradley. Designers: Betty Clayman-DeAtley, Jennifer C, Christiansen, Beth Laundon; Jane! Kiley. Art: John R. Anderson, Jr., Jeffrey L. Osborn, Asst. Directors; Kris Hannah; Christopher A. Klein, Artist; Elie Boettinger, Ann R. Perry, Research, Engraving and Printing: George Bounelis, Director; Judy L. Garvey, Wiliam D. Reicherts

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(esomeprazole magnesium)

N exi um? (esomeprazole magnesium) 20-MG, 40-MG Delayed-Release Capsules

BRIEF SUMMARY Before prescribing NEXIUM, please see full Prescribing Information, INDICATIONS AND USAGE NEXIUM is indicated for the short-term treatment (4 to 8 weeks) in the healing and symptomatic resolution of diagnostically confirmed erosive esophagitis, CONTRAINDICATIONS NEXIUM is contraindicated in patients with known hypersensitivity to any component of the formulation or to substituted benzimida- zoles. PRECAUTIONS Symptomatic response to therapy with NEXIUM does not preclude the presence of gastric malignancy. Atrophic gastritis has been noted occasionally in gastric corpus biopsies from patients treated long-term with omeprazole, of which NEXIUM is an enantiomer. ion for Patients: NEXIUM Delayed-Release Capsules should be taken at least one hour before meals. For patients who have difficulty swallowing capsules, one tablespoon of applesauce can be added to an empty bowl and the NEXIUM Delayed-Release Capsule opened, and the pellets carefully emptied onto the apple sauce, The pellets should be mixed with the applesauce and then swallowed immediately. The applesauce used should not be hot and should be soft enough to be swallowed without chewing, The pellets should not be chewed or crushed. The pellet/applesauce mixture should fot be stored for future use. Antacids may be used while taking NEXIUM. Drug Interactions: Esomeprazole is extensively metabolized in the liver by CYP2C19 and CYP3A4. In vitro and in vivo studies have shown that esomeprazole is not likely to inhibit CYPs 12, 2A6, 209, 206, 2E1 and 3A4. No clinically relevant interactions with drugs metab- lized by these CYP enzymes would be expected, Drug interaction studies have shown that esomeprazole does not have any clinically significant interactions with phenytoin, warfarin, quinidine, clarithromycin or amoxicillin. Esomeprazole may potentially interfere with CYP2C19, the major esomeprazole metabolizing enzyme. Coadministration of esomeprazole 30 mg and diazepam, a CYP2C19 substrate, resulted in a 45% decrease in clearance ot diazepam, Increased plasma levels of diazepam were observed 12 hours after dosing and onwards. However, at that time, the plasma levels of diazepam were below the therapeutic interval, and thus this interaction is unlikely to be of clinical relevance. Esomeprazole inhibits gastric acid secretion, Therefore, esomeprazole may interfere with the absorption of drugs Where gastric pH is an important determinant of bioavailability (eg, ketoconazole, iron salts and digoxin), Goadministration of oral contraceptives, diazepam, phenytoin, or quinidine did not seem to change the pharmacokinetic profile of esomeprazole. Carcinogenesis, Mutagenesis, Impairment of Fertility: The carcinogenic potential of esomepra- 2ole was assessed using omeprazole studies. In two 24-month oral carcinogenicity studies {n rats, omeprazole at daily doses of 1.7, 3.4, 13.8, 44.0 and 140.8 mg/kg/day (about 0.7 to 57 times the human dose of 20 mg/day expressed on a body surface area basis) produced gastric ECL cell carcinoids in a dose-related manner in both male and female rats; the inci- dence of this effect was markedly higher in female rats, which had higher blood levels of omeprazole, Gastric carcinoids seldom occur in the untreated rat. In addition, ECL cell hyperplasia was present in all treated groups of both sexes. In one of these studies, female fats were treated with 13.8 mg omeprazole/kg/day (about 5.6 times the human dose on a body surface area basis) for 1 year, then followed for an additional year without the drug. No carcinoids were seen in these rats. An increased incidence of treatment-related ECL cell hyperplasia was observed at the end of 1 year (94% treated vs 10% controls). By the second year the difference between treated and control rats was much smaller (46% vs 26%) but Still showed more hyperplasia in the treated group. Gastric adenocarcinoma was seen in one fat (2%). No similar tumor was seen in male or female rats treated for 2 years. For this strain of rat no similar tumor has been noted historically, but a finding involving only one tumor is difficult to interpret. A 78-week mouse carcinogenicity study of omeprazole did not show increased tumor occurrence, but the study was not conclusive. Esomeprazole was negative in the Ames mutation test, in the in vive rat bone marrow cell chromosome aberration test, and the in vive mouse micronucleus test. Esomeprazole, however, was positive in the in vitro human lymphocyte chromosome aberration test. Omeprazole was positive in the in vitro human lymphocyte chromosome aberration test, the in vivo mouse bone marrow cell chro- mosome aberration test, and the in vivo mouse micronucleus test, The potential effects of esomeprazole on fertility and reproductive performance were assessed using omeprazole studies. Omeprazole at oral doses up to 138 mg/kg/day in rats (about 56 times the human dose on a body surface area basis) was found to have no effect on reproductive performance of parental animals. Pregnancy: Teratogenic Effects. Pregnancy Category B—Teratology studies have been performed in rats at oral doses up to 280 mg/kg/day (about 57 times the human dose on a hody surface area basis) and in rabbits at oral doses up to 86 ma/kg/day {about 35 times the human dose on a dody surface area basis) and have revealed no evidence of impaired fertility or harm to the fetus due to esomeprazole. There are, however, ‘no adequate and well-controlled studies in pregnant women. Because animal reproduction studies are not always predictive of human response, this drug should be used during preg- nancy only if clearly needed. Teratology studies conducted with omeprazole in rats at oral doses up to 138 mg/kg/day (about 56 times the human dose on a body surface area basis) and in rabbits at doses up to 69 mg/kg/day (about 56 times the human dose on a body ‘surface area basis) did not disclose any evidence for a teratogenic potential of omeprazole. In rabbits, omeprazole in a dose range of 6.9 to 69.1 mg/kg/day (about 5.5 to 56 times the human dose on a body surface area basis) produced dose-related increases in embryo- lethality, fetal resorptions, and pregnancy disruptions. In rats, dose-related embryo/etal toxicity and postnatal developmental toxicity were observed in offspring resulting from parents treated with omeprazole at 13.8 to 138.0 mg/kg/day {about 5.6 to 56 times the human doses on a body surface area basis). There are no adequate and well-controlled

Please read this summary carefully, and then ask your doctor about NEXIUM . No advertisement can provide all the information needed to prescribe a drug. This advertisement does not Pe CAUCE EDC careful discussions with your doctor. Only your doctor has the training to weigh the risks and benefits of a prescription drug for you.

studies in pregnant women. Sporadic reports have been received of congenital abnormalities ‘occurring in infants born to women who have received omeprazole during pregnancy. jursing : The excretion of esomeprazole in milk has not been studied, However, omeprazole concentrations have been measured in breast milk of 2 woman following oral administration of 20 mg. Because esomeprazole is likely to be excreted in human milk, because of the potential for serious adverse reactions in nursing infants from esomeprazole, and because of the potential for tumorigenicity shown for omeprazole in rat carcinogenicity studies, a decision should be made whether to discontinue nursing or to discontinue the drug, taking into account the importance of the drug to the mother. Pediatric Use: Safety and effectiveness in pediatric patients have not been established. Geriatric Use: 0f the total number of patients who received NEXIUM in clinical trials, 778 were 65 to 74 years of age and 124 patients were 2 75 years of age. No overall differ- ‘ences in safety and efficacy were observed between the elderly and younger individuals, and other reported clinical experience has not identified differences in responses between the elderly and younger patients, but greater sensitivity of some older individuals cannot be ruled out. ADVERSE REACTIONS The safety of NEXIUM was evaluated in over 10,000 patients (aged 18-84 years) in clinical trials worldwide including over 7,400 patients in the United States and over 2,600 patients in Europe and Canada. Over 2.900 patients were treated in long-term studies for up to 6-12 months, In general, NEXIUM was well tolerated in both short- and long-term clinical trials. The safety in the treatment of healing of erosive esophagitis was assessed in four randomized comparative clinical trials, which included 1,240 patients on NEXIUM 20 mg, 2,434 patients on NEXIUM 40 mg, and 3,008 patients on omeprazole 20 mq daily. The most frequently occurring adverse events (21%) in all three groups was headache (5.5, 5.0, and 3.8, respectively) and diarrhea (no difference among the three groups), Nausea, flatulence, abdominal pain, constipation, and dry mouth occurred at similar rates among patients taking NEXIUM or omeprazole. Additional adverse events that were reported as possibly or probably related to NEXIUM with an incidence < 1% are listed below by body system: Body as a Whole: abdomen enlarged, allergic reaction, asthenia, back pain, chest pain, chest pain substernal, facial edema, peripheral edema, hot flushes, fatigue, fever, flu-like disorder, generalized edema, leg edema, malaise, pain, rigors; Cardiovascular: flushing, hypertension, tachycardia; Endocrine: goiter, Gastrointestinal: bowel irregularity, constipation aggravated, dyspepsia, dysphagia, dysplasia Gi, epigastric pain, eructation, esophageal disorder, frequent stools, gastroenteritis, GI hemorrhage, GI ‘symptoms not otherwise specified, hiccup, melena, mouth disorder, pharynx disorder, rectal disorder, serum gastrin increased, tongue disorder, tongue edema, ulcerative stomatitis, vomiting; Hearing: earache, tinnitus; Hematologic: anemia, anemia hypochromic, cervical lymphoadenopathy, epistaxis, leukocytosis, leukopenia, thrombocytopenia, Hepatic: biliru- binemia, hepatic function abnormal, SGOT increased, SGPT increased; Melabalic/ ‘Nutritional: glycosuria, hyperuricemia, hyponatremia, increased alkaline phosphatase, thirst, vitamin B12 deficiency, weight increase, weight decrease; Musculoskeletal: arthralgia, arthritis aggravated, arthropathy, cramps, fibromyalgia syndrome, hernia, polymyalgia rheumatica; Nervous System/Psychiatric: anorexia, apathy, appetite increased, confusion, depression aggravated, dizziness, hypertonia, nervousness, hypoesthesia, impo- tence, insomnia, migraine, migraine aggravated, paresthesia, sleep disorder, somnolence, tremor, vertigo, visual field defect: Reproductive: dysmenorrhea, menstrual disorder, vaginitis; Respiratory: asthma aggravated, coughing, dyspnea, larynx edema, pharyngitis, thinitis, sinusitis; Skin and Appendages: acne, angioedema, dermatitis, pruritus, pruritus ani, rash, rash erythematous, rash maculo-papular, skin inflammation, sweating increased, urticaria; Special Senses: otitis media, parosmia, taste loss, taste perversion; Urogenital: abnormal urine, albuminuria, cystitis, dysuria, fungal infection, hematuria, micturition frequency, moniliasis, genital moniliasis, polyuria; Visual: conjunctivitis, vision abnormal, Endoscopic findings that were reported as adverse events include: duodenitis, esophagitis, esophageal stricture, esophageal ulceration, esophageal varices, gastric ulcer, gastritis, hemia, benign polyps or nodules, Barrett's esophagus, and mucosal discoloration. Postmarketing Reports - There have been spontaneous reports of adverse events with post- marketing use of esomeprazole, These reports have included rare cases of anaphylactic reac- tion. Other adverse events not observed with NEXIUM, but occurring with omeprazole can be found in the omeprazole package insert, ADVERSE REACTIONS section, OVER- DOSAGE A single oral dose of esomeprazole at 510 mg/kg (about 103 times the human dose on a body surface area basis), was lethal to rats. The major signs of acuté toxicity were reduced motor activity, changes in respiratory frequency, tremor, ataxia, and intermittent clonic convulsions. There have been no reports of overdose with esomeprazole. Reports have been received of overdosage with omeprazole in humans. Doses ranged up to 2.400 mg (120 times the usual recommended clinical dose). Manifestations were variable, but included Confusion, drowsiness, blurred vision, tachycardia, nausea, diaphoresis, flushing, headache, dry mouth, and other adverse reactions similar to those seen in normal clinical experience (see omeprazole package insert-ADVERSE REACTIONS). No specific antidote for esomepra- zole is known, Since esomeprazole is extensively protein bound, it is not expected to be removed by dialysis, In the event of overdosage, treatment should be symptomatic and supportive. As with the management of any overdose, the possibility of multiple drug inges- tion should be considered. For current information on treatment of any drug overdose, a certified Regional Poison Control Center should be contacted. Telephone numbers are listed in the Physicians’ Desk Reference (PDR) or local telephone book, NEXIUM is a registered trademark of the AstraZeneca group. AstraZeneca 2002 x its reserved. & 10177 Ra. 0802 AstraZeneca

She is a nomad.

She travels by donkey. She prays for rain.

She survives with little.

She is rich.

Around the globe, wealth is measured in many ways. Explore the diverse definitions of what it means to be well-off.

Geography of : Wealth

NATIONAL SUN A GEOGRAPHIC

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Forum

March 2003

Writer Andrew Cockburn has said that politics is a national sport in Puerto Rico, and we have the mail to prove it. A month after publication, his article had generated letters from nearly 800 readers—most of them

angered by what they see as a distorted portrayal of Puerto Rico.

Cracking the mystery

Opinions also flared in more than 3,800 postings on our online forum (nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0303), a new record.

Puerto Rico

By concentrating on interviews with people who favor indepen- dence, you did a disservice to 95 percent of the population, who favor either the current status or statehood. Puerto Ricans pay social security and medicare as do taxpayers on the mainland. Puerto Ricans have joined the U.S. military in every conflict since WWI. A Puerto Rican was the pilot in the only plane shot down during the attack on Libya in 1986. During his burial ser- vice his mother said she was very proud that her son had given his life for our country.

DAVID PLACERES

Orlando, Florida

Was the article created in revenge for some bad experience on the island—a mugging or a loss of equipment? Andrew Cockburn and Amy Toensing manage to make Puerto Rico look like the hellhole of the Caribbean. Maybe the next time they visit, they

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should leave the slums and tour the island. I did, and managed to find a lot of beautiful places. LOUIS REVERON Tall Timber, Maryland

It was obvious to me that there was an intent to portray only the grotesque and the obscure. Why were Puerto Rican professionals and their work places, houses, and families not featured? Why weren't average middle-class families profiled? There are drugs and lost souls in every society. I wonder how Texans would react if the “Lone Star Republic” was portrayed with photos of the Ku Klux Klan, Enron executives, and people shooting up in Houston’s fifth ward?

RAMON BERROCAL

San Juan, Puerto Rico

How does a state withdraw from the Union and become a com- monwealth? I nominate my home state, Ohio. Puerto Ricans pay no federal income taxes, yet get the privileges of citizenship and seemingly unlimited welfare without verification of income— that’s what I want for everyone in Ohio. I gladly will give up our votes in Congress. GARY HRUSCH North Ridgeville, Ohio

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY

“For the increase and diffusion of geographic knowledge.”

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BOARD OF TRUSTEES GILBERT M. GROSVENOR, Chairman REG MURPHY, Vice Chairman

JOAN ABRAHAMSON, WILLIAM L, ALLED MARTHA E. CHURCH, MICHAEL COLLINS, ROGER A. ENRICO, JOHN M. FAHEY, JR,,

JAMES H. GILLIAM, JR., DANIEL S. GOLDIN, JOHN JAY LIN, JAMES C, KAU J. WILLARD. MARRIOTT, JR., FLORETTA DUKES McKENZIE, PATRICK F. NOONAN, NATHANIEL P. REED, WILLIAM K. REILLY, ROZANNE L. RIDGWAY, JAI R. SASSER, B. FRANCIS SAUL II,

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TRUSTEES EMERITUS

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Mrs. Lyndon B. Johnson, Laurance S. Rockefeller, Robert C. Seamans, Jr., Fredenck G. Vosburgh

COUNCIL OF ADVISORS

Roger A. Enrico, Chairman; Michael R. Bonsignore, Howard Buffett, Craig D. Campbell, Juliet C. Folger, Robert A. Hefne! il, Samuel C. Johnson, Bruce L. Ludwig, Sally Engelhard Pingree, W. Russell Ramsey, Edward P, Roski, Jr., Alice Roge Rubenstein, 8. Francis Saul Il, Garry A. Weber

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FORUM

Dinosaurs Please assure Jack Horner that

he has at least one supporter for his hypothesis that T. rex was a scavenger, not a predator.

Over 50 years ago | offered the same hypothesis in an under- graduate paper based on the observation that modern pred- ators such as lions have large,

strong forelimbs and paws with which to catch and bring down prey. By contrast, T: re forelimbs were inadequate to do the job. I was upbraided for questioning the truth as revealed by my betters. Is it possible that my professor is still among those who have failed to be per- suaded by Horner?

H. W, PETERSEN

Bellevue, Washington

When the coal mine shut down a few years ago, we lost the secu- rity that it provided the many track sites near Grande Cache, Alberta. Since then we have been trying to get protective status for these sites, which are suscepti- ble to vandalism, theft, and in- dustrial activity. The wonderful

photograph on pages 30-31 has raised the awareness of these sites as paleontological resources that need to be pre- served, and will go a long way in helping to achieve this goal. RICH McCREA Uni

Edmonton, Alberta

ity of Alberta

I was pleased to participate in the dinosaur article by using colored balls to illustrate the heart sizes of Argentinosaurus with a fully elevated head. However, I wish to point out that the calculations of heart size were based on a paper published by Roger Seymour and Harvey Lillywhite in 2000. The essential contribution of these scientists should have been noted in the caption. DENNIS L. CLAUSSEN

Miami University Oxford, Ohio

Those who feel offended by the article should examine the facts before insulting the writer of this piece. We, the people of Puerto Rico, are our own worst enemy when we refuse to acknowledge the truth about our situation. Corrupt politicians, a mediocre public school system, a paternal- istic welfare government, and

an economic system that milks the middle class to feed both the poor and the wealthy are all a part of a problem that we've created ourselves. With a 19 per- cent teen pregnancy rate and a

National Geographic Magazine, PO Box 98199, Washington, DC 20090-8199, or by fax to 202-828-5460, or via the Internet to ngsforum@nationalgeo graphic.com. Include name, address, and daytime telephone. Letters may be edited for clarity and length.

murder rate that is more than three times as great as that of the U.S., we need to take a good long look at ourselves and stop

being such cry babies. One of the worst legacies of colonialism is the victim mentality that it generates. As for Puerto Rico’s future, the only way to make it better is to assume responsibility for ourselves and stop blaming others for our problems. ROBERT GUZMAN Moca, Puerto Rico FROM OUR ONLINE FORUM nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0303

Although it may be true that 60 percent of Puerto Ricans qualify for public assistance, the article excluded some important infor- mation. Because salaries in Puerto Rico are extremely low— and the cost of goods is higher than in the United States—many

NATIONAL GEOGR

people with jobs still qualify for public assistance. EDWIN RIVAS Putnam Valley, New York

lama military spouse stationed with my husband at Naval Sta- tion Roosevelt Roads in Puerto Rico. I have lived here for two years and have enjoyed myself immensely, In your article, inter- viewee Luis Ramos describes the island of Vieques as a “com- bat zone.” The truth is that the bombing range is used only a few times each year for a couple of weeks. Mr. Cockburn fails

to mention the miles of fence line that have been destroyed during the “peaceful protests,” the broken glass and rocks thrown at the military police, and the thousands of dollars wasted when military exercises get delayed. He also fails to

5

APHIC * JULY 2003

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if there is such a thing. From the family of Chevy” Trucks. The most dependable, longest-lasting trucks on the road’

THROUGH SUBDIVISIONS. THIS IS THE OPPOSITE.

Show 'em what gas-charged shocks and 17" off-road tires are all about. Soon you'll be the subject of puma lore —

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FORUM

mention the jobs provided by the military and the funding given to residents to boost their economic opportunities. CARRIE FORRESTER Ceiba, Puerto Rico

West Indies Map I found your map of the West Indies fascinating. I noticed a small U.S.-held island just west of Haiti called Navassa. How did it become a part of the U.S. and does anyone reside there?

BRIAN DOWLING

Troy, Michigan

Navassa became a U.S. territory because of bird droppings. The Guano Islands Act of 1856 sanctioned U.S. citizens to take possession of any unclaimed, uninhabited island in the world that contained guano. A represen- tative of a Baltimore fertilizer company claimed Navassa for guano mining in 1857. When African-American laborers rebelled against horrific working conditions in 1889, five white supervisors were killed. A Balti- more trial handed down death sentences, but petitions from the black community swayed Pres- ident Benjamin Harrison to com- mute the sentences to jail time. Guano operations ended in 1898. The uninhabited rocky island is now a national wildlife refuge open only to researchers.

Qatar

Of course the young men of Qatar have a right to their opin- ion about the greatness of Osa- ma bin Laden, but isn’t it a bit hypocritical to praise the man while drinking Starbucks coffee? If he had his way, they would not have the freedom to drink Amer- ican coffee or eat American food or attend American universities. And to be certain, the young women wearing “stunning,

The young women wearing “stunning, stylish outfits” under their abayas would not have the freedom to study fashion at the university. They would not even have the free- dom to learn to read.

stylish outfits” under their abayas would not have the freedom to study fashion at the university. They would not even have the freedom to learn to read. KATHLEEN TAKACH Tallahassee, Florida

Wrangell-St. Elias National Park My husband proposed to me atop a mountain pass in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park. I remember the sublime view of Mount Wrangell stand- ing behind us and the Chugach range sprawled out before us. Thanks so much to John Mit- chell for bringing back those memories and to Frans Lanting for the absolutely breathtaking photographs.

LISA HATFIELD

Portland, Oregon

You made me proud of just

being on a planet with places

like Wrangell-St. Elias National

Park—proud, and ready with

renewed determination to do my

small part to protect the precious

planet we all share as home. JANETHA B. BOSWELL

Fort Collins, Colorado

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

Behind the Scenes Why does it not surprise me that France is one of the countries in which the D-Day cover of the June 2002 Nationat Geo- GRAPHIC was not used? I can understand Germany and per- haps Poland, but France? The decision by your French editor not to use the cover honoring those who fought and died at Normandy is a disgrace to your fine magazine and dishonors the thousands of American dead who repose in cemeteries there. BRENT F. MOODY Phoenix, Arizona

How ironic that the French would put a woman’s butt on their cover rather than the flag of the country that saved their butt on D-Day. SANDY BUCKNER Cumberland Furnace, Tennessee

NGM-France editor Frangois Marot felt that the cover on “Marriages in France” would outsell the D-Day cover on the newsstand—an important con- sideration because, unlike in the U.S., most of NGM-Frantce’s circulation comes from the newsstand. Our local-language editions occasionally create articles of specific interest to their region; the marriage cover was timed to coincide with June, a traditional month for weddings in France. The D-Day story remained in the issue and is among the most popular stories to run since the edition’s debut in 1999, buttressing Marot’s view that “the French are still very grateful for America’s role in World War II.”

We occasionally make our customer fist available to carefully screened companies whose products or services may be of interest to you. It you prefer nat to receive such mailings, U.S. and Canadian customers please call 1-800-NGS-LINE (1-800: 647-5463), Intemational customers please call +1-813-979- 6845 or write: National Geographic Society, PO Box 63005, ‘Tampa, Fl 33663-3005. Please include the address area from your magazine wrappet when writing

getfulness turned out to be . But we didn’t just sit nothing.

- oe im got her to a doctor right away ‘ah and he put her on ARICEPT? Now she’s doing better.*

If a person forgets names, places or facts - and has trouble with everyday things like 7 reading or shopping — it may not be normal rs ' aging. It could be Alzheimer’s disease. So it's ___ important to see a doctor as soon as you can.

There is no cure for Alzheimer’s. But a prescription drug called ARICEPT” hi used by millions of people to help their symptoms.

In studies, ARICEPT* has been proven to work for mild to moderate Alzheimer's. It has helped people improve their memory over time. It has also helped them to keep doing everyday things on their own, longer.

Ask your doctor if ARICEPT” is right for you or your loved one. It is the #1 prescribed drug for Alzheimer's in the world. The sooner you ry * know it's Alzheimer’s, the sooner ARICEPT”

‘ can help.

ONCE-A-DAY

(donepezil HC]

|G AND 10-MG TABLETS

Strength in the face of Alzheimer’s”

; rd - r everyone . sleeping To learn more and to receive wanting a memory checklist, mild and call 800-760-6029 ext.55 CEPT® may or visit www.aricept.com

hould tell their

ARICEPT® is well tolerated but may\not b Some people may experience nausea, di well, vomitingymuscle cramps, feeling very to eat. In Studies, these side effects v Went away over time. Some people experience fainting. P. doctors because their

*\ndividual responses to ARICEPT® can be different — Please see additional important product panying page people may get f, Stay the same or not get better.

ONCE-A-UaY

AXRICEPT (donepezil HCtttun

STRENGTH IN THE FACE OF ALZHEIMER’

ARICEPT® (Donepezil Hydrochloride Tablets)

Briel Summary —see package insert for full prescribing information INDICATIONS AND USAGE ARICEPT" is indicated {or the treatment of mild to moderate dementia of the Alzheimer’s ype CONTRAINDICATIONS ARICEPT" js contraindicated ‘inpatients with knawn hypersensitivity to donepezil hydrochloride oto piperidine derivatives. WARNINGS Anesthesia: ARICEPT®, asa cholinesterase infubifor, is likely fo exaggerate succinylcholiné-type muscle relaxation during anesthesia. Cardiovascular Conditions: Because of their pharmacological action, cholinesterase inhibitors may have vagotanc elects ‘nthe sinoatial and strioventvicular nodes: This eftect may manilest as bradycardia or heart block in patie both with and without ‘known underlying cardiac conducion abnormalities. Syncopal episodes have been reported in association with the use of ARICEPT” Gastrointestinal Conditions: Through their primary action. cholinesterase inhibitors may be expected to increase gastric ‘aid secretion due to increased cholinergic activity. Therefore, patients should be monitored closely for symploms of active or ‘occult gaslvointestinal bleeding, especially those at inoveased risk for developing ulcers, eg. those with a history of ulcer disease or thase receiving concurrent nonsteroidal anti-inflarimatory drugs (NSAIDS) Clinical studies of ARICEPT" have shown ‘No jryorease, relative to placebo, in the incidence of either peptic ulcer disease or gastrointestinal bleeding. ARICEPT*, as a predictable consequence o its pharmacological properties, has Deen shown! fo produce diarthes, nausea and vomiting, These sflects, when they occur, appear nore frequently withthe 10 mg/day dose than with the 5 mg/day dose. In mast cases. these effects have been mild and transient, sometimes lasting one to three weeks, and have resolved during continued use ot ARICEPT®. Genifourinary: Athough not observed in clinical triats ot ARICEPT®, cholinomimetics may cause bladder outiow obstreion Conditions: Seicures: Cholinomimetics are believed to have some potential to cause generalized ccorivutslons. However seizure activity also nay bea man(testation of Alherner’s Disease. Pulmonary Conditions: Because ot thei ccholinmimetic actions, cholinesterase inhibitors should! be prescribed with care to patients with a history of asthrr or obstructive pulmonaty disease PRECAUTIONS Drug-Drug Interactions Drugs Highly Bound to Plasma Proteins: Oru ‘displacement studies have been performed (n vitro between this highly bound drug (96%) and other drugs such as furosemide, digoxin, and wartarin, ARICEPT® at concentrations of 03-10 pg/ml did not affect the binding of furosemide (S.pg/mL), digoxin (2 ng/ml), and wartarin (3 pg/mL) to human albumin. Similary, the binding of ARICEPT® to human albumin ‘was (01 alfectod by turasemide, digoxin, and warlarin. EMeet of ARICEPT” on the Metabolism of Other Drugs: No ‘In vivo clinical tris have investigated the effect of ARICEPT® onthe clearance of drugs metabolizes by CYP 3A4 (eg cisapride, lerferadina) or by CYP 206 (2.9. Imipramine). However, (a vitro studies show a low rate of binding to these (mean K( about 50-130 JM), tat, given the therapeutic plasma concentrations of donepezil (164 nM), indicates Ite ikeliNood of ‘iverforence Whether ARICEPT® has any potential for enzyme induction és not known. Effect of Other Drugs on the Metabolism of ARICEPT: Ketoconazole and quinidine, inhibitors of CYP450, 244 and 206, respectively intibit donepezlt ‘metabolism in vitro. Whether thete is a clinical efect ofthese Inhibitors Is not known. Inducers of CYP 206 and CYP SAA (eg, pherivtoin, carbamazepine, dexamethasone, ritaripin, and phenobartital) could increas the rte of elimination of ARICEPT” Use with Anticholinergies: Because ol their mechanism of action, cholinesterase inhibitors have the potential to intertere with

‘he activity of anticholinegic medications. Use with Cholinomimetics and Other Cholinesterase Inhibitors: ‘A synergistic ellect may be expected when cholinesterase inhibitors are given concurrently with succinyichoine, simiar neurornuscular blocking agents or cholinergic agonists Such as bethanechol. Carcinogenesis, i

of Fertility Carcinogenicity studies of donepezt! have not been completed. Danepen wa not mutagenic inthe Ames reverse ‘mutation assay in tactera. In the chromosome aberration test nt cultures of Chinese hamster lung (CHL) celts, some ‘clastogeniceflects were observed. Onnepezt! was not claslogenic in the jn vivo mouse micronucleus test. Donepezi had no effect on fertility in rats at doses up to 10 mg/kg/day (approximately 8 times the maximum recommended huran dase on a \nig/n’ basis). Pregnancy Category C: Teratology studies conducted in pregnant rats at doses up to 16 ‘mg/kw'day (approximately 13 times the maximum recommended human dose on @ mg/n basis) and in pregnant rabbits at loss upto 10 mg/day (approximately 16 times the maximury recommended human dose on a mfr basis) cid not disclose any evidence fora teratolenic potential of donepezil. However, na study i which pregnant rats were gwven up to 10 mg/kg/day {approximately 8 times the maximum recommended human ose on amig/ basis) rom day 17 of gestation through day 20 ‘postpartum, tere was a slight \ncrease in stil biehs and a slight decrease in pup survival thvough day 4 postpartum at this dose, the next lower dose tented was 3 mg/ko/day. There are no adequate or well-controlled studies in pregrant women. ARICEPT® should te used during pregnancy only the potential benefit jusiies the potential risk tothe fetus. Nursing Mathers I is ‘ot known whether donepezi is excreted in human breast milk. ARICEPT® tas no indication for use in nursing mothers. Pediatric Use There are no adequate and well-controlled trals to document the safety and eficacy of ARICEPT® in any iliness ‘occuring in children REACTIONS Adverse Events Leading to Discontinuation The ates of discontinuation ‘torn controlled clinical trials of ARICEPT® cue to adverse events forthe ARICEPT® 5 mg/day treatment groups were comparable to those of placebo-treatment groups at approximately 5%. The rate of discontinuation ot patients who received 7-day ‘escalations trom 5 mg/day to 10 mg/day, was higher al 13%. The most common adverse events leading a discontinuation, delined as those cccurring in. at least 2% of patients and at twice the incidence seen in placebo patients, are shown in Table 1

Table 1. Most Frequent Adverse Events Leading to Withdrawal trom Controtied Clinical Trials by Dose Group

Dose Group Placebo 5 mg/day ARICEPT* 10 mg/day ARICEPT” Patients Randomized — 955 350 315

Ever

Nausea 1% % 3%

Djarrhea 0% 1% % Vomiting M% tM %

‘Most Frequent Adverse Clinical Events Seen in Association with the Use of ARICEPT® The most common adverse ‘avents, defined as those occurring at a trequancy ot at least 5% in patients receiving 10 mg/day and twice the placebo rate are argdly predicted by ARICEPT’ cholinomimetic effects. These include nausea, darrhea, insomnia, voriting, muscle cramp, fatigut and anorexia Thes# ativerse events were often of mild intensity and transient, resolving during continued ARICEPT® treatment without the teed for dose modification, There is widence to suggest thatthe frequency of these common adverse ‘evi may be affected by the rate of tration, An open-label study was conducted with 269 patients who recerved placeta in the 15- and 30-week studies, These patlents were trated oa dase of 10 mg/day aver a 6-week period. The rates of common adverse events were lower ihan those seen in patients titrated to 10 mg/day over one week in the controll clinical rials and were comparable to those seen in patients on 5 mg/day. See Table 2 for a compatison ot the most common adverse events following one and six wenktiratlon regimens.

Table 2. Comparison of Rates of Adverse Events in Patients Titrated to 10 mg/day Over 1 and 6 Weeks n One-week titration —_Six-week titration

Adverse Event Placebo 5 mpliay 10

(n=315) (n=311) 5) (1 Nausea 6% 5% 19% 6% laren 5% 8% 15% % Insomnia 6% 6% 14% oe Fatigue 38 4% &% % Vomiting 3% M% 8% 5% Muscle cramps 2% 6% 8% co Arorexia % 3% ™% 3%

Adverse Events Reported in Controlled Trials The events cilad retict experience gained under closaly monitored conditions of clinical tials in. high selected patient population, in actual clinical practice rin ther cimical rials, these frequency estimates ‘may nol anply, as the conditions of use, reporting behavior, and the kinds of pafients treated may die. Table 3 lists tretment emergent sigrts and symptoms that were reported in atleast 2% of pallens in placebo-contralie trials who received! ARICEPT” ‘and for which the rate of occurrence was greater lor ARICEPT" assigned than placebo assigned patients. In general, adverse events occurred more frequently in female patients and with advancing age

Table 3. Adverse Events Reported in Controlied Clinical Trials in al Least 2% ol Patients Receiving ARICEPT® (donepezil HCI) and at a Higher Frequency than Placebo-treated Patients

Body System/Adverse Event Placebo ARICEPT® (n=355) (n=747)

Percent of Patients with any Adverse Event 7 4 Body as a Whole ‘Headache

Pain, vasious locations Accident

anaes

Fatigue Cardiovascular System

‘Syncope Digestive System

Nausea

Diattea

Vomiting

Anorexia Hemic and Lymphatic System

Eochymasis Metabolic and Nutritional Systems Weight Decrease 1 3 Musculoskeletal System Muscle Cramps 2 Atri 1 ‘Nervous System Insomnia Dizziness Depression ‘Abnormal Dreams Somnolence Urogenital System Frequent Urination f 2 Other Adverse Events Observed During Clinical Trials ARICEPT" has been administered (0 over 1700 incividuals alury ‘clinical als worldwide. Approximately 1200 ot these patients Nave been treated for at least 3 ymonths and more tha 1000 patients have been treated for at least 6 months. Controlled and uncontrolled Wials jn the United States include 900 patents In regards to the highest dose of 10 may, this poputation includes 650 patients ted or 3 mon 475 patients treated for 6 months and 116 pallens treated for over 1 year. The range ot palient exposure is trom 1 t 1214 days. Treatment emesgent signs andl symptoms thal occurred during 3 controlled clinical tials and two open-label ria inthe United States were recorded as adverse events by the clinical investigators using terminology of their own choosing To provide an overall estimate of the proportion ot individuals having similar types of events, the events were grouped into smaller numberof standardized categories using a modified COSTART dictionary and event frequencies were calculated acros al studies. These categories are used inthe listing below. The trequericies represent the proportion of 900 patients fom thes tral who experienced that event while receiving ARICEPT” All adverse events occurring al least twice are Included, excep for thase already listed in Tables 2or 3, COSTART terms too general 10 be informative, or events less likely to be drug caused Evens are classified by body system and listed using the following definitions: hequent adverse events—thor occurring | at least 1/100 patients; infrequent adverse events—those occurring in 1/100 to 1/1000 patients. These adverse events ar ‘not necessarily related to ARICEPT® trealment and in most cases were observed at @ similar trequericy in placebo-treated pation in he controlled studies. No important additional adverse events were seen i studies conducted outside the United State Body as a Whole: Frequent. intluenva, chest pain, toothache, Infrequent: tever, edema face, periorbital edema, her) hiatal, abscess, cellulitis, chills, generalized coldness. head lullness,lstlessness. Cardiovascular System: Froquen ‘hypertension. vasodilation, ara fiitaion, hot ashes, Nypotension; Infrequent angina pectoris, postural typotension, myocard Infarction, AV block (irst degree), congestive heart failure, arteritis, bradycardia, peripheral vascular disease, supravantricul tachycardia, deep vein thrombosis: Digestive System: Frequer fecal incontinence, gastointestinal bleeding, bloating. epigast ‘pain, Inhequent ecuctation, gingivitis, increased appetite, Ratulence, periodontal absoes,cholelithiass, divticulitis, drooling, dry rout ‘ver sore, gastits, initable colon. tongue eda, epigasin distress, gastroenteritis, increased transaminases, Nermomtoids, deus, increase this, jaundice, meena, polydipsia, duodenal ulae, stomach ulcer Endocrine System; Jidaquevit diabetes mellitus, goiter. Hem ‘and Lymphatic System: /ntrequent anemia, thrombocythemia. thrombocytopenia, eosinophilia, eythrocytopenla, Metabolic ar ‘Nutritional Disorders: Frequent detydration, ahequent goul typokalemnia, increased creatine kinase, hyperglycemia, weight inqreas increased lactate dehydrogenase. Musculoskeletal System: Frequent, bone fracture, /nrequent’ muscle weakness, must tesciculation. Nervous System: Frequent: delusions, temo, ability, paresthesia, aggression, vertigo, ata, incresed ibid ‘restlessness, abnormal crying, Nervousness, aphasia; (nfrequent: cerebrovascular accident, intracranial hemayrhage, Wansier Ischemic atack, emotional lability, neuralgia, coldness (localized), muscle spasm. dysphoria, gait abnormality, Nypertoni ‘hypokinesia, neurodermatitis. numbness (localized), paranoia, dysarthvia, dysphasia, Nostliy, decreased libido, melancholi -rvotional withdrawal, nystagmus, pacing. Respiratory System: Frequent: dyspnea, sore taal, ranctitis:Irequenepist ‘pee rasa drip, pneumonia, hyperventilation, pulmonary congestion, wheszing, hypoxia, pharyngitis, pleursy, pulmonary collaps sleep apnea, snoring Skin and Appendages: Frequent: prurlus, daphoress, urticaria, Infrequent dermatitis, ery, ki discoloration, ‘alopecia, ungal dermal, herpes zoster, hirsutism, skin striae, night sweats, skin uloat Specta ‘Senses: Frequent. cataract, eye lritation, vision blurred; infrequent: dry eyes, glaucoma, earache, tinnitus, blephatiti cecreasad hearing, retinal hemorrhage. ois xterra os media, bad tase, conjunctival hemorrhage, sar buzzing, mobion sickness ‘spots belore eyes. Urogenital System: Frequent: urinary incortinenoe, nocturia, frequen: dysurla, hematuria, urinary urgenc ‘metrorthagia, ystitis, enuresis, prostate hypertrophy, pyelonephritis, inability to empty bladder, breast titroadenosis, fbrocyst rest, mastitis, pyutia, renal failure, vaginitis. Postintroduction Reports Voluntary reports of adverse events temporal associated with ARICEPT" that have been received since market inroduction that are no listed above, and that there is inadequal data {0 determine the causal relationship with the drug include the following: abdominal pain, agitation, cholecysti confusion, convulsions. hallucinations. heart block (all types). hemolytic anemia, hepatitis, hyponatremia, neurolept ‘malignant syndrome. pancreatitis. and rash. OVERDOSAGE Because strategies for the management of averdos are continually evolving, it is advisable to contact a Poison Control Center to determine the lates recommendations for the ‘of an overdose of any drug. As i any case of overdose, general support ‘measures should be utilized. Overdosage with cholinesterase inhibitors can result in cholinergic crisis characterized by seve ‘ause, vomiting, slivation, sweating, bradycardia, hypotension, respiratory depression, collapse and convulsions: Inoreasin muscle weakness |S a possibility and may result in death if respiratory muscles are involved. Testiary anticholinergics such a «atropine may be used as an antidote for ARICEPT® overdosage. Intravenous atropine sultato titrated to effect is recommenda an nial dose of 7.0 02.0 mg IV with subsequent doses based upon clinical response. Alypicalresjiorses in blood press ‘and heart rate have been reported with other cholingrmimetics when co-administered wi quateiary aticholinergics such glycopyrrolate. It ts not known whether ARICEPT® and/or its metabolites can be removed by dialysis (hemodialysis, peritone alysis, or hemofiltration) Oose-related signs of toxicity in animals included reduced: ‘Movement, prone positiar staggeting gait, lacrimation, clonic convulsions, depressed respiration, salvation, miosis, mors, tasciculation and low body surtace temperature DOSAGE AND ADMINISTRATION The dosages of ARICEPT” shown to be ettactive in controll ‘nical trials are 5 mg and 10 mg axininstered once per day The higher dase of 10 mg did nol provide a stalsicaly signiticat (greater clinical benefit than 5 mg, There isa Suggestion, based upon order ol group mean scores and dose ter ‘analyses of data trom these clinical tral, that a daily dose of 10 mg of ARICEPT® might provide additional tenet kar son patients. Accordingly, whether or not ta employ a dase at 10mg is a rater of prescriber and palien preference. Evidence to the controlied trials indicates thatthe 10 mg dose, wih a one week titration, is likely 1b be associated witha higher inckdune of cholinergic adverse events than the 5 mg dase. in open label tials using a 6 week titration, the frequency of these sar adverse events was similar between the 5 mg and 10 mq dese groups. Theretore, because steady state Is not achieved fr 1 ays and because the incidence of untoward ettects may be influenced by the rate o! dose escalation, treatment with a dos cof 101mg should not be contemplated until patients have been on a daily dose of § mg for 4 to 6 weeks. ARICEPT® shoul t taken in the evening, just prior to retiring, and may be taken with of without food.

(®

ARICEPT™ is a registered trademark of Eisai Co,, Lid.

menue Ss

ewes wa

20017 Revised December 200

Eisai Inc.

Traneck, O76

U.S. Pharmaceuticals ‘ew Yor, MY 1087

EL187x01MD

Allrights reservec

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,

An Archaeologist’s Lament

Mourning the sack of the Iraq Museum, an expert assesses the toll

IUSEUM, THE rE

MUSHIN HASAN, DEPUTY DIF IN When bombs started falling on Iraq in March, ! had the same first thought that every archaeologist who’s ever done fieldwork there must have had: What will happen to the Iraqis who worked with us—people who welcomed us into their homes? Fortunately that question has been answe' My

‘OR OF THE |

friends and colleagues survived the war.

But I soon saw my second greatest fear become reality: Much of the unique record of the Mesopo- tamian civilization that blossomed between the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers 6,000 years ago was stolen or irreparably damaged. Tens of thousands of artifacts at the Iraq Museum in Baghdad were lost over the course of three chaotic days in early April. Not all of these treasures were claimed by frenzied mobs of looters. Some were probably stolen in an organized plot by art thieves, a scheme that might have been thwarted had coalition forces heeded pleas from the world’s archaeologists to protect the museum.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

MARIO TAMA, GETTY IMAGES

Among the museum’s collections were not only

the statues of gods and goddesses, the poss

ssions of kings and queens, law codes and religious texts, but also the mundane items of daily life. There were the 60,000-year-old flint tools and fragmen- tary skeletons of early humans from Shanidar Cave in the mountains of northern Iraq. There were sickle blades left by some of the world’s first farmers 10,000 years ago. And there were tens of thou- sands of pottery fragments, which not only tell us about everyday activities in the past eight millen- nia, but also (because their styles change rapidly and these changes have been carefully studied) enable archaeologists to know the age of layers in which they’re found.

Perhaps the most valuable artifacts were thou- sands of clay tablets covered with cuneiform signs, written between 3200 B.c. and a.p. 75. It’s unclear how many of these tablets were lost, but each one is a treasure for scholars. All early civilizations kept

APHICA

CaR EA ok BU R) HEC KS V EARS Ee

A gallery of priceless artifacts from the Iraq Museum in Baghdad

Boat model DATE: circa 4500 b.c. Found in an Ubaid grave at a site called Eridu, a baked clay model of a boat (its wood mast is restored) is the best preserved example of early water transport in

Mosque door DATE: 12th century AD,

Adorned with floral and geometric designs, a rare two-panel door from a mosque in the city of Mosul was crafted 500 years

after Islam took root STEVE MCCURRY

in tra Mesopotamia, status: Stolen starus: Unknown See feebeon engi Gold bull- Little king DATE: late eighth headed lyre 2 DATE: circa 3000 2.c panbiniee LYNN ABERCROMBIE DATE: circa 2500 a.c, With inlaid eyes of Made of ivoty; color Statue of An exquisite example shell and lapis lazuli, was added with inlays Sumerian of the lyre—an instru- this finely carved ala of gold, carnelian, and worshiper ment invented by the baster figure stands lapis lazull

DATE: circa 2600 8. This stone statue was placed in a temple

to pray perpetually for the life of the donor. Religion and ritual per.

Sumerians around 3200 8.c.—from the royal cemetery of Ur. The gold-covered bull's head was at- tached to a sound

just seven inches tall STATUS: Unknown Found beneath a

temple in the ancient city of Uruk (today’s Warka), it was likely a portrait of En, the

GIANNI DAGLI ORTI, CORBIS

formed a fundamental LYNN ABERCROMBIE box decorated with Wark: city's ruler, role in the lives of Warka head colored stones and aicere STATUS: Unknown early Mesopotamians. are: circa 3000 a,c, _ bits of shell DATE: circa 3000 8.c

STATUS: Gold torn off One of the earliest One of the most re- depictions of the

fined pieces of early hierarchy of the world

sculpture, this life-size as understood by the marble head of a Mesopotamians:

woman originally had plants, animals, hu- a headdress and mans, and gods. The

STATUS: Unknown

LYNN ABERCROMBIE

eyes and eyebrows alabaster vase was a Lizard-faced of inlaid stone. It was valuable commodity terra-cotta possibly part of a in its time. figurine

statue of Inana, Sumerian goddess of love and war.

DATE: circa 4000 2.0, This curious effigy of a human male is

STATUS: Stolen

LYNN ABERCROMBIE

STATUS: Stolen Stone sue characteristic of the TRIN Ubaid culture. Male Bassetki statue EES TREN scribe and female figurines DATE: circa 22508,c. Shanidar skull DATE: circa 2400.8.c. with jizard-like faces LYNN ABERCROMBIE An inscription on DATE: circa 50,000 This high official of the have Been found in Cuneiform the base of the 350- years old city of Girsu may have graves and temples calendar from pound cast-copper Skeletons from Shani- established a system at Ur and Eridu Nimrud monument proclaims dar Cave are the only of weights andmea- sg tarys: Unknown DATE: circa 850 a.. the military victories Neandertal fossils sures. Stone blocks Written almost 2,500 of an Akkadian king. found to date in south- AVART RESOURCE, NY roughly equivalent to —Clemens Reichel, yeats after Sumerians Though only the bot- west Asia east of the Lions of Tell 24 ounces have been Marisa J. Larson, and created cunelform— tom half of the male Jordan River. This skull Harmal found inscribed with Jeanne E. Peters the world’s first writing figure was intact when belonged to a male DATE: circa 1800 a.c. his name. Artifact status accu: —this small tablet discovered, it was who suffered severe Two large, snarling ‘STATUS: Unknown rate at press time. listed daily instruc- prized for its realism. injuries yet lived to lions in terra-cotta tions for the seventh Such statues were the relatively old age Guarded the entrance PPWEBSITE EXCLUSIVE | month of the year. commonly depicted of 45—evidence of to a temple. To Meso- Example: Avoid eating in artwork from the social behavior: To potamians they were For updates on the status of artifacts— garlic on the second time, but this was the survive he must have fearful symbols of and links to other sites and resources day orriskadeathin only example discov- _ been cared for by gods and kings. 's heri opal the family. ered so far. members of his group. STATUS: Heads about Iraq's heritage—go to national

STATUS: Unknown STATUS: Stolen STATUS: Unknown smashed geographic.com/ngm/0307.

GEOGRAPHICA

AFTERMATH OF MAYHEM PATRICK BA, AFP daily records, but most were on perishable materials that vanished long ago (papyrus in Egypt, palm leaves in India, wood and bamboo in China, cotton and wool twine in Peru). But these clay tablets were different. With careful excavation, cleaning, and baking for preservation, the tablets revealed every- thing from business accounts to intimate letters between friends. Because lab work is expensive and few specialists can read the long-dead Sumerian and Akkadian languages, the work is slow, and many of the tablets were as yet unbaked and unread.

The looting and damage of the museum may not be the only archaeological tragedy. Innumerable artifacts remain unexcavated across the country. Some 160 years of excavation have taught us much

about Iraq's ancient cities, but our understanding of thousands of smaller rural sites is based largely on hasty preliminary surveys. In these surveys we've learned that ancient landscapes are often sur- prisingly well preserved but fragile, unlikely to survive the passage of heavy armored vehicles. | well remember finding 3,300-year-old plow furrows, with water jars still lying by small feeder canals, near Ur in southern Iraq, an area that this spring saw much conflict—and plenty of tank traffic.

We may never know how many unexcavated finds were crushed by tanks, how many fragile objects were shattered by looters, or how many of the museum’s artifacts were sold to private collectors or melted down for their gold. As soon as reports of the looting reached us, we begged authorities to inspect vehicles leaving Iraq and to urge citizens to return objects to the museum voluntarily—which some began doing within days. (Apparently some artifacts had been stashed for safekeeping by well- meaning individuals.) Officials and scholars rushed to reconstruct collection records, many of which are duplicated in the records of institutions around the world that sponsor scientific excavation. And teams of museum professionals from several coun- tries have joined Iraqi curators to compile a defini- tive, illustrated inventory of what’s been taken—a list that’s being circulated to Interpol, national police forces, museums, and responsible galleries.

Thanks to these efforts, by the time you read this some of the items pictured on the previous page may have been found. But I’m not naive: No matter what we do to get these pieces back, we'll never find them all. In my 48 years as an archaeologist I’ve never felt so angry about the abuse of the past. What has been lost is not only the heritage of a nation; it is the heritage of the world.

—Henry Wright

NGS COMMITTEE FOR RESEARCH AND EXPLORATION

HELP MAINTAIN CONNECTIONS TO THE PAST

a

The devastating loss of Iraq's historic treasures isn’t an iso- lated event. Around the world artifacts and monuments are threatened by war, the ele- ments, and a lack of resources to preserve them. In response, the Society has created the World Cultures Fund to support the work of archaeologists,

curators, and artists wherever the history of civilizations is at risk. One of the fund's flagship projects is an expedition led by Henry Wright to assess the sta- tus of Iraq's cultural resources. You can support this expedi- tion and preserve cultural treasures worldwide by going to nationalgeographic.com/help,

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

clicking on “Urgent Funding Need,” and donating online. Gifts may also be mailed to World Cultures Fund, National Geo- graphic Society Development Office, 1145 17th Street NW, Washington, DC 20036.

—John M. Fahey, Jr.

PRESIDENT AND CEO NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY

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Take a comprehensive look at the extraordinary military campaign dubbed “Operation Iraqi Freedom," as National Geographic goes beyond the headlines to take you to the frontlines of the war in Iraq. Discover the inside story behind a high tech, high speed war that was like no other. What weapons and equipment were used? What role did special forces play? Hear firsthand accounts from soldiers, learn the keys to the military strategy from the experts, and find out just what it took to defeat Saddam Hussein. With spectacular footage never before seen in the U.S., this remarkable DVD also comes loaded with a full arsenal of bonus features From the “shock and awe” air campaign, to the dramatic rescue of POW Jessica Lynch, 27 Days To Baghdad reveals the big picture of the war that toppled Saddam Hussein's regime.

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NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

Legal Notice

If You Purchased the Drug BuSpar® or buspirone HCl from February 5, 1995, through January 31, 2003

Your Rights May Be Affected by a Class Action Settlement.

There is a proposed settlement of the class action lawsuit, /n re Buspirone Antitrust Litigation, MDL-1413 (S.D.N.Y.), brought by the Attorneys General of 50 states, Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia. Under the terms of the Settlement, you may be able to make a claim for a recovery for your purchase of BuSpar® or buspirone HCI

What is the Lawsuit About?

Plaintiffs allege that Bristol-Myers Squibb (“BMS”) engaged in fraudulent conduct and conspired with a potential competitor to prevent the entry of generic competitors and illegally maintain its monopoly in the United States over the sale of buspirone hydrochloride-based prescription drugs. Through its unlawful

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prevented, causing consumers and government entities to pay higher prices for BuSpar® and buspirone HCI and lose the substantial cost savings that generic versions of the same drugs would have produced. Defendants have denied any wrongdoing or liability.

Can | Benefit From the Settlement? If you are a consumer within the United States, including Puerto Rico, who purchased BuSpar® or generic buspirone HCI in the United States or Puerto Rico from February 5, 1995, through January 31, 2003, you are Te ba & ea BuSpar

a member of the Settlement Class. However, only if you made purchases from January |, 1998, through January 31, 2003, will you be able to file a claim for a cash recovery ingredient What are the Terms of the Settlement? Approximately $41.7 million has been set aside to reimburse consumers some

medication

portion of any alleged overcha they may have incurred from purchasing BuSpar” or buspirone HC! during the claims period.

What Are My Legal Rights?

* If you wish to remain a member of the Settlement Group, you do not need to take any action to remain a member. However, to share in the settlement fund you must file a

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claim as discussed below. If the Court approves the proposed Settlement, you will be bound by all orders of the Court and any legal claims you may have against the Defendants relating to the conduct alleged in the lawsuit will be released,

If you do not wish to remain a member of the Settlement Group, you must mail a written request for exclusion, postmarked on or before October 10, 2003, to the BuSpar® Antitrust Litigation Administrator at PO Box 1682, Faribault, MN 55021-1682. If you do not mail a written request for exclusion, you will remain a member of the Settlement Group.

As a member of the Settlement Group, you may object to the Proposed Settlement, enter an appearance in this matter through counsel, or appear at the final approval hearing.

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Behind the

*"SCENES

Ma AT

NATIONAL

GEOGRA

Big Is Beautiful

Paintings of China fill a broad canvas

Imost all the artists who

paint for Natronat GEo-

GRAPHIC work on can- vases larger than these pages, but they’ve seldom created paintings as large as Chinese-born artist Hongnian Zhang’s extraordinary work for the story on the Shang and other Bronze Age cultures. Each of his three paintings mea- sures eight feet wide and four feet high, making them perhaps the biggest created for the mag zine since the 1920s. Each took a month to paint; Hongnian was still putting the finishing touches

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC +

on them in the Socie' graphic studio (above), just be- fore transparencies were shot for reproduction in the magazine. Why work big? Hongnian says it gives his work more power. Chris Sloan, the magazine's art director, says it’s difficult for art- ists to capture detail on a small canvas, and that reducing a large painting for publication elimi- nates brushstrokes and can make scenes look more realistic. Chris liked the big versions too: He

’s photo-

bought the canvases to add to the

Society’s permanent collection.

JULY 2003

PHIC

CHETY

~ —<

NGS PHOTOGRAPHER MARK THIESSEN

NO SEX, PLEASE

When illustrations editor Kathy Moran began to assemble photos for this month’s article on sexual selection, she e-mailed some 250 photographers and photographic agencies around the world, ask- ing for their help. But a quarter of the e-mails bounced back unread to Kathy and her assis- tant, Leah Boonthanom. Even- tually they learned why: Many automatic e-mail filtering sys- tems read the subject line, “Sex- ual Selection Article,” to mean that NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC was sending them pornography. “We'd probably have been better off calling it ‘The Birds and the Bees, ” Kathy says.

Yellow-faced Amazon (Amazona xant! i 7.cm Weight: Less than 200 g Semi-arid scrubland with low cerrado trees throughout eastern and cent g number: Unknown; populations declining

WILDLIFE AS CANON SEES IT

Looks can kill. Witness the y aced amazon, __ bird perilously near human plantations and habitations. whose gorgeous plumage makes it a tempting target + While the yellow-faced amazon’s beauty makes it an for the worldwide wild animal trade. Noisy and eye- object of desire around the world, its home range is catching, the charismatic parrot is not the hardest bird suffering rapid, ongoing destruction to spot. It travels in pairs or flocks numbering as high as As an active, committed global corporation, we join the thirties, ranging widely in search of its favorite worldwide efforts to promote awareness of enda seeds and fruit, particularly mangoes. Its liking species. Just one way we are working to make the world ingoes is so strong, in fact, that it brings the bold a better place—today and tomorrow.

= Canon

www.canon.com

BEHIND: THE SCENES

A Scientist's Tiny Discovery

Ultimate Explorer's Mayor finds new primate

ireya Mayor leads a

double life. On Sunday

nights she’s on the air as a correspondent for National Geographic Ultimate Explorer. Otherwise she’s a Fulbright scholar and primatologist about to earn her doctorate in anthro- pology from Stony Brook Uni- versity. Now she has yet another distinction: She’s part of a team that discovered a new species of mouse lemur—the smallest primates known to science—in Madagascar.

Mireya and colleagues from

TOOL BOX

Mission Getting close enough to photograph Atlantic salmon (see page 100) without scaring them away.

Tool Closed-circuit rebreather. How it works Rebreathers recycle air, removing carbon

and adding oxygen as needed. “You can stay down up to two hours,” says photographer Paul Nicklen (right), “and you don’t put bubbles in the water. Salmon hate bubbles.”

dioxide with chemical scrubbers

Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo were doing fieldwork on the island nation’s northeast coast on endangered primates, study- ing their behavior, diet, and genetic makeup. One rainy night she and project leader Edward Louis set out half a dozen traps

in the mountainous rain forest. When they checked them the next day, they found a “semi- frozen” mouse lemur—a noctur- nal species that builds nests in

trees—huddled inside one trap. “We filled a plastic bag to create a makeshift hot-water bottle, and I held the animal against me to let it get some of my body heat,” she says. “Even- tually it came around. The specimen, an easy hand- ful for Mireya (left), jooked different from other mouse lemurs, and genetic tests confirmed that it was a species never

before reported. Mireya returned to the area with an Ultimate Explorer x camera crew and observed half a dozen of the creatures. The resulting show, King Kong in My Pocket, will be broadcast on Sunday, June 29, at 8 p.m. ET/PT on MSNBC.

PAUL NICKLEN

To learn more about a subject covered in this issue, try these National Geographic Society products and services. Call 1-888-225-5647 or log on

to nationalgeographic.com

for more information.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

NEW STORY OF CHINA’S PAST (PAGE 56)

1 China Expedition. Explore Bronze Age China and cruise the Yangtze River with National Geographic Expeditions in October 2003. For information visit nationalgeographic.com/ ngexpeditions or call 1-888-966-8687.

@ China Political Map created by National Geographic Maps ($10.99).

@& China's Ancient Past Online. View a portfolio of more photos by 0. Louis Mazzatenta

on the Shang dynasty and recent Bronze Age discoveries, click on Web links, and get a bib- liography of the magazine story at nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0307. Exclusive photos, links, and a bibliography appear online for all feature magazine articles.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

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THE SCIENCE OF THINGS

INNOVATION

Technophobia?

How tools grow up to be toys

ew technologies are always a little scary. In Michael Crichton’s recent novel, Prey,

microscopic cameras designed to diagnose disease in humans somehow turn into a crafty, carnivorous robotic swarm that eats people alive. (Mon- sters are more complicated than they used to be.)

Bill Joy, co-founder of Sun Micro-

systems, has warned that the merger of biotechnology and nanotechnol- ogy could endanger the human species. Fiendish scientists might, in theory, engineer lethal, molecule- size, self-replicating “nanobots.” Eric Drexler, a pioneer in nanotech, fears that synthetic pathogens could someday drift across the planet like pollen and destroy the biosphere.

Here at the Who Knew? desk we've long since stopped sleeping at night. We just cower, 24-7-365. But we — also try to remind ourselves that people have warned of techno- logical doom since approximately the invention of the wheel. (“Every- one will go too fast and crash!”)

No one can ever know precisely how technology will be used. Guglielmo Marconi thought the radio would be a tool for ship- to-shore communication. Inventors always imagine technology being put to a high-minded, serious use, but people often end up exploiting it for their per- sonal needs, even—egad—their amusement. Technology, when fully mature, is often just a toy.

Who Knew?

technology-watchers predict will end up on people’s desktops in the future, the digital fabricator—or “fabber.” Industrial fabbers already exist, making small, three-dimensional objects with complex shapes—car parts and replicas of human bones, for example—from digital models. Neil Gershenfeld, director of MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms, says that with a personal fabricator you could make your own cell phone, your own clock radio, even a computer. It would be analogous to a printer. You'd design something on your desktop computer, hit “Print” (or “Fab”), and out would pop your new creation. “It’s like taking the tools of the factory and putting them in your own home,” Gershenfeld says. Physicist Freeman Dyson thinks that people might someday combine biotech and fabbers to create new life-forms, like flowers, or even very unusual pets. “You could imagine growing furniture if you could per- suade a tree to grow in the right shape,” Dyson says. “It’s the same thing that happened with computing. The computer was originally intended only for serious, practical applications.” Dyson works at the Institute for Advanced Study, in Princeton, and remembers the early, truck- size computer built there in the 1940s and ’50s. It was designed to study the weather and the processes within nuclear explosions. Important things. Practical things. No one envisioned all that genius winding up inside a Game Boy.

So it will be interesting to see q —Joel Achenbach

New technologies can also make life less scary. A doctor friend told Gavriel Iddan stories of patients miserable with unexplained ab- dominal pain. Moved, the Israeli engineer spent ten years developing a capsule endoscope—packing a video camera, bat- tery, light, and wire- less transmitter into a device roughly the size of a big vitamin pill. Now instead of enduring exploratory surgery or other inva- sive tests, patients can swallow Iddan’s device, which moves painlessly along the gastrointestinal tract and captures images of the entire length of the small intestine. They can go home, drive, or even work during the six to eight hours the process lasts. Making diagno- sis less frightening matters: Many people suffer untreated, afraid that the tests needed to figure out what's hurting them will hurt even more. —Lynne Warren

Learn more about strange new technologies and find links to Joe! Achenbach’s work at nationalgeographic

-com/ngm/resources/0307.

what happens with a gizmo many (jy WASHINGTON POST STAFF WRITER

PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY CARY WOLINSKY AND DAVID DERANIAN NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

»

‘

j Fifty years after the Korean War ended in an uneasy truce, two of the world’s most lethal armies face y ; ; off across the cease-fire line. If war erupts again between the two Koreas, it will likely begin here.

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Wel lelalare meciaaliare(cim tatela the two Koreas remain officially at war, a ten- foot-high barbed-wire fence marches along the southern side of the DMZ. Both nations maintain 148-mile-long barriers to protect their borders at the DMZ, which runs north of the 38th parallel. The sign flashes patriotic slogans in a bid to demoralize North Korean border guards.

BY TOM O'NEILL NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SENIOR WRITER PHOTOGRAPHS BY MICHAEL YAMASHITA

Day eighteen thousand, give or tare.

few, of the cease-fire between South and North Korea begins like most other days: Soldiers are preparing for war. In the bitter cold of pre-dawn darkness, 15 South Korean infantrymen huddle together on a road outside a sleeping farm village and streak their faces with camouflage paint.

They snap magazines of live ammunition into their M4 assault rifles. With the wind comes a faint strain of martial music, as if from a ghostly parade, carrying from huge speakers mounted across the border in North Korea. At a hand signal from the platoon leader, the soldiers noise- lessly line up and then disperse, melting into the surrounding blackness.

Their mission is to patrol a short stretch of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), the contentious no-man’s-land that has divided the two Koreas for 50 years. The bright lights of Seoul, the South Korean capital, burn less than 35 miles away, but here in the fenced-off, land-mined, guard- towered DMZ, the only reality is a shadowy cat- and-mouse game played between soldiers of warring armies. Every 15 minutes the radioman murmurs the platoon’s position back to the com- mand post: a road, a rice field dike, now the bor- der itself.

As the platoon approaches a North Korean guard tower, the leader signals his men to stay alert. If the patrol is particularly lucky, a North Korean soldier will recklessly dash through the brush and offer to defect with state secrets. If it is particularly unlucky, the North Koreans will open fire. That would be unlucky for all of us: In a worst-case scenario, Korea’s uneasy peace could shatter, spilling war across the peninsula, with millions killed, and then possibly on to China, Japan, and beyond, pushing the world toward possible nuclear war.

Apocalyptic thoughts come easy here. In a world full of scary places—Kashmir, Chech- nya, the West Bank—the DMZ is perhaps the

6 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

scariest of all, considering the massive fire- power deployed on both sides and the brink- manship practiced by the rival camps. All along the 148-mile truce line that bisects the Korean peninsula, hundreds of thousands of well- trained troops from two of the world’s larg- est armies (plus more than half of the 37,000 United States troops stationed in South Korea) stand ready to fight, trained by their command- ers to hate their ideological opposites and never to let their defenses down.

This state of emergency has persisted since July 27, 1953, when an armistice agreement halted the vicious fighting of the three-year-old Korean War. The origins of the conflict go back to the end of World War II, when the peninsula was split at the 38th parallel by the Soviet Union and the United States as the Allies drove Japan out of Korea. With the tacit consent of its Soviet patron, North Korea launched a surprise, tank- led invasion across the line on June 25, 1950, seeking to impose communist rule throughout the peninsula. China, another freshly minted communist power, entered the war in October, sending waves of soldiers into North Korea when UN forces threatened to overrun the Yalu River on the Chinese border. By 1953 almost 900,000 soldiers had died—and more than two million civilians had been killed or wounded—as the South Korean military, joined by United Nations troops composed mostly of American units, battled the forces of North Korea and China to a standstill.

The end of fighting did not bring an end to hostilities. To separate enemies straining at their

IF LOOKS COULD KILL, body counts would multiply daily at Panmunjom, the

one place in the DMZ where soldiers routinely come eye to eye with their enemies. A North Korean sentry (above) shows his war face to an Ameri- can officer, part of the United Nations Military Armistice Commission charged with monitoring discussions with the North. Helmeted UN guards (below) assume a martial-arts stance as they stare across the border, part of the scenery for Chinese tourists gathered on a rooftop.

leashes, the armistice carved out the DMZ, a 2.5-mile-wide swath of mostly mountainous land stretching across the peninsula near the 38th parallel (inset map, right) designed to serve as a buffer zone, off-limits to large troop concentrations and to heavy weaponry like tanks and artillery. Straight down its cen- ter was drawn the political border, called the Military Demarcation Line (MDL). Then as now, anyone trying to cross the MDL would likely be shot.

To this day, South Korea and North Korea do not recognize each other as sovereign nations. In fact the two Koreas are officially still at war. And often they act like it, keeping tensions sharp as a blade throughout the peninsula and espe- cially along the DMZ.

Recently things have grown dramatically worse. Confronted with U.S, intelligence, the North Korean government last fall suggested that it was secretly enriching uranium to produce nuclear weapons. Early this year it withdrew from the nuclear Nonproliferation

Treaty and moved to reactivate a plutonium- reprocessing facility, also to produce weapons material. And then in April, during talks with U.S. officials in Beijing, North Korea asserted that it already possessed nuclear weapons. Did these developments alarm the troops? “Not really,’ shrugs an American officer stationed just outside the DMZ. “We can’t ratchet up the security any higher than it already is.”

ust getting to the DMZ is a challenge.

To join the South Korean pre-dawn

patrol, I had to pass through several

military checkpoints. One checkpoint guards an entrance to the Civilian Control Zone (CCZ), a high-security belt three to twelve miles wide that borders the length of the Demilitarized Zone. Another checkpoint guards the DMZ itself, right outside Camp Bonifas, one of the westernmost bases along the front line. The 600 South Korean and American troops stationed there provide protection to government officials, military officers, and other guests who come to Panmunjom, a neutral meeting place inside the DMZ. The troops, known as the United Nations Command Security Battalion, also serve as a thin first line of defense against a North Korean attack. “Some call us a speed bump,” Capt. Brian Davis, my escort, says matter-of-factly.

8 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

Scale varies in this perspective The DMZ is 148 miles (238 km) long

= 100,000 troops =) =—To Baengnyeong Island 60 miles (97 Pi

Yellow Sea

Troops within 60 miles (97 km) of the DMZ

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INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT

Though soldiers guarding the DMZ (below) carry only hand-

guns and rifles, the armies massed on either side of it hold enough firepower to raze the peninsula. Equipped with chemical, biological, and possibly nuclear weapons, the North has targeted Seoul, South Korea’s capital, with hundreds of artillery pieces. South Korean and U.S. forces— with superior air and tank power—train constantly to repel an attack.

"harvests oysters from

spiked beach fortifica-

~ tions on Baengnyeong

Island in the Yellow — Sea. Last year a clash

* between North and

South Korean patrol boats left six dead nearby. Border skir- mishes have claimed 1,373 lives since 1953.

“2

Lerwal bo ad

“But if an invasion happens, we'll defend the DMZ and evacuate noncombatants.”

Cleared to enter the DMZ and join the patrol, I climb into a Humvee, the bulky, all-terrain vehicle of the U.S. military. As we rumble north- ward through the dark with the headlights off, Captain Davis hands me a pair of $3,600 elec- tronic night-vision goggles, standard issue for the forward troops.

In the eerie green glow of the goggles, I see the DMZ fence loom up like a jungle wall—a ten-foot-tall chain-link barrier with a canopy of coiled razor wire. A rock-hard embankment, erected to stop onrushing tanks, edges the fence on the other side. Beyond that the ground is seeded with mines. Watchtowers crop up every hundred yards or so. Except for the areas where steep terrain makes man-made obstacles un- necessary, this bristly fence walls the peninsula into two irreconcilable halves.

We drive through a gate in the fence, cross- ing into the DMZ, and soon we sight the platoon as it prepares to set out on patrol. I quickly apply camouflage paint to my face, take a place in the soldiers’ line, and begin walking. An hour into the patrol the sky begins to lighten, causing the soldiers to crouch down and switch off their goggles.

It is a vulnerable time, these moments dividing night from day, and the soldiers wait in their defen- sive posture for a couple of minutes until their eyes readjust. We are within sight of the tightly clus- tered farmhouses in the hamlet of Daeseong-dong, the only South Korean settlement allowed to exist inside the DMZ. No lights shine in the windows. Daeseong-dong’s 225 residents live under a strict curfew: off the streets by eleven, confined until dawn.

“Look, there’s the enemy,” a soldier in front of me says, motioning his head toward a squat concrete guard tower rising up across the MDL less than 50 yards from us. North Korean sol- diers in brown uniforms press against its win- dows, squinting through binoculars and firing off photographs as if we’re some kind of wild- life attraction.

“It’s OK; we want them to see us,” mutters

12 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

Captain Davis. “These patrols say to North Korea: ‘We're here, we’re armed, and we're not afraid of you.”

In the early light we can make out Kijong- dong, North Korea’s only DMZ village, an orderly collection of buildings fronted by a flag- pole 52 stories high, the tallest in the world. A strong, cold wind, compliments of Siberia, barely manages to ripple the huge 600-pound red, white, and blue North Korean flag. Soldier of Fortune magazine, | had been told, will pay big money for a piece of that flag.

Our patrol’s in-your-face attitude is com- pletely lost on the village: Its population is zero. The fancy-looking apartment buildings are actually flimsy movie-set facades with painted- on windows. Kijongdong, nicknamed Propa- ganda Village by U.S. and South Korean troops, was built in the 1950s to lure defectors to cross over to the good life in North Korea. So far there have been no takers.

As the sun cracks the horizon, ragged for- mations of geese and ducks begin to pass

noisily above us and swoop down on the fields. The soldiers don’t appear to notice. Grimly, silently, they finish the patrol.

The truce has survived another night in the DMZ, and morning brings a sense of peace. But don’t be fooled by the quiet, cautions Maj. Kim Bong Su, a senior Korean officer back at Bon- ifas. “The North Koreans are the same blood as us, but they are the enemy. They always have a gun pointed at my soldiers’ hearts.”

A

*%

in the remote military camps along the DMZ. At a mountain post South Korean conscripts (above) spend free time building their body armor—and playing Ping-Pong. A typical day’s training includes a bout of hand-to-hand combat (below) in a martial-arts drill. For happy hour at Camp Bonifas (left), American officers let off steam by burning wood scraps, drinking beer, and telling war stories. Land mines occasion- ally explode in the distance, set off by some unlucky deer.

Smoke bombs and r the sounds of artillery ‘ and sniper fire simu- - _late battle as medics ' “pr ice evacuating a

er under barbed wire. Says a U.S. offi: cer: “We train on the 4 ground we'll fight on. y And raat two

y first few hours in the DMZ schools

me in how the military views the sit-

uation: It’s good guys versus bad

guys, and everyone’s trigger finger is itchy. But just as Propaganda Village is not what it appears, the professed state of war along the DMZ at times also seems weirdly unreal, as if the soldiers are actors at a historical theme park—call it WarLand—in a disconnect espe- cially noticeable when civilian life intrudes. Two hours after the South Korean platoon retires to its barracks, tourist buses stream onto the base, delivering giddy visitors eager to buy pieces of DMZ barbed wire strung on plaques and caps emblazoned with the Bonifas motto, “In Front of Them All.”

Farmers from Daeseong-dong drift into the rice fields, ignoring their armed escorts as they climb onto threshing machines to resume the harvest. Only descendants of the village’s pre- war residents are allowed with their families to live in Daeseong-dong. That’s where I meet Kim Ok Ja, standing on the edge of a field in a heavy quilted jacket and muddy rubber boots. She first came to Daeseong- dong as a bride, introduced to her husband through a matchmaker. “When I moved here in 1972, I was scared to live so close to North Korea,” Mrs. Kim says, watching her husband maneuver the thresher through a field. “I guess I hadn’t realized that this was a front line. But I did know that my husband was a good farmer.”

A good and affluent farmer. Because of the relatively large farms (roughly 22 acres) and because resi- dents don’t pay taxes, Daeseong- dong’s farmers earn an average of $53,600 a year, more than twice what rice growers make elsewhere in South Korea. As an added bonus, village boys are excused from military service, mandatory for other Korean males. There’s a catch, of course: the nightly curfew, the armed chaper- ones, and the sporadic threats posed by North Korean infiltrators.

Inside his one-story farmhouse, with rad- ishes and peppers drying on the floor, Kim Kyong Min tells me how a few years back a North Korean platoon kidnapped his mother and

16 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

brother while they were collecting acorns. They were held for four nights and then released. “We don’t know why the soldiers took them,” Mr. Kim says. “Thankfully my mother was treated well.”

Mr. Kim, a native of Daeseong-dong, betrays no hard feelings about the abduction. He also shrugs off the barrage of music and sloganeering from speakers in nearby North Korea. “I don’t even notice it anymore,” he laughs. “Let’s see what they’re saying.” He stares into space, listening to the voice coming through his walls. “It says, “This is paradise. Come over so you can have a good meal of rice”” He smiles and pours a cup of tea.

Meanwhile in nearby Seoul, a dense high-rise city of ten million, no one, I wager, is staying home this morning out of fear of the 500 North Korean artillery pieces aimed at the city. In fact, last December South Koreans elected as presi- dent Roh Moo-hyun, a former labor lawyer who suggested in his campaign that the United States, with its in-country troops and the Bush Admin- istration’s “axis of evil” rhetoric, was pushing the two Koreas further apart. Roh’s election

signaled that many South Koreans want to make up with what they see as an eccentric, gun-crazy, but essentially harmless relative.

Sixteen miles south of the DMZ, inside a bunker with 600 tons of concrete overhead, Capt. Bill Brockman of the U.S. Second Infantry Divi- sion is doing a good job of scaring his audience about what lies north of the border. Captain Brockman, dressed in battle fatigues, has invited members of the press to the war room at Camp

barely ruffles the routines of Chun Jong Sam and his family (above), residents of Daeseong-dong, South Korea’s only village inside the DMZ. The 225 inhabitants learn to live with an 11 p.m. curfew— and with armed guards in the rice fields (below). In the distance rises North Korea’s DMZ “town” called Propaganda Village, a facade built to feign pros- perity. On South Korean highways, camouflaged towers called tank traps (left) are wired to explode and block the advance of North Korean tanks.

Red Cloud in the town of Uijeongbu, the divi- sion headquarters, for a briefing on North Korea. “We are facing a formidable force, one of the larg- est militaries in the world,” Captain Brockman says. “North Korea has an army of over a million soldiers, 70 percent of them deployed within 12 hours of the border. We're within range of 10,000 artillery tubes. That’s enough cannon fire to put Stalin and Napoleon to shame.”

For the next hour Captain Brockman describes North Korea’s bag of tricks: submarines to sneak

The security shield has inadvertently preserved the largest piece of undeveloped land— more than 960 square miles—in South Korea.

troops ashore; infiltration tunnels dug under the DMZ, four of which have been discovered so far; sleeper cells of terrorists inside South Korea; and most frightening of all, 700 to 1,000 ballistic mis- siles that could be armed with biological, chem- ical, and possibly even nuclear weapons. North Korea's threat could reach even farther, as it readies long-range missiles capable of reaching the West Coast of the United States.

“Our equipment will dominate theirs in a fight,” Captain Brockman says, referring to the advanced weaponry of the U.S. forces and South Korea, with its 690,000 soldiers. “The big advantage the enemy has is its size. They could sweep across the border in successive waves.”

Few military analysts expect North Korea to launch a full-scale attack; it would be suicidal, given that the counterattack would likely leave the country in ruins, Another Korean war would cost the lives of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, in the densely populated and econom- ically vital South Korean territory near the DMZ. It would create millions of refugees, even with- out the use of weapons of mass destruction.

But even if a new Korean War seems unthink- able, what keeps DMZ troops on high alert is North Korea’s greatest menace: its unpredict- able leader. Kim Jong I], a secretive and ruthless dictator, presides like a cult deity over one of the world’s most closed societies. Under his leader- ship the country of 23 million people is col- lapsing economically: Experts estimate that at least 2.5 million North Koreans have died from hunger during the past decade. Yet North Korea diverts most of its scant resources into its

18 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

military. Because of its inbred hostility to the outside world and because of Kim Jong II’s fear of an attack by the United States, North Korea will likely continue building its huge arsenal, the only bargaining chip it has left to play.

“We literally have a hair-trigger situation that could erupt at any time,” Captain Brockman concludes from inside the bunker. “If the North Korean economy collapses, we fear that the lead- ers may have a use-it or lose-it mentality with their weaponry. So we wonder: Instead of crum- bling quietly like East Ger- many, would North Korea go for broke?” The ques- tion hangs in the air like a radioactive cloud.

Despite a politically charged atmosphere of saber rattling and dire threats—and notwithstanding all the macho talk tossed around like firecrackers at military camps and guard posts—actual confrontations occur almost exclusively within the half-mile-wide enclave of Panmunjom, the DMZ’s “truce village” where the opposing sides come to talk.

The most notorious incident here occurred in 1976 when North Korean troops, upset at a tree-cutting operation near one of their guard towers, bludgeoned two American officers to death with ax handles. In 1984 a 30-minute firefight erupted when North Korean soldiers crossed the line to chase after a defector. Across the DMZ as a whole, a half century of skirmishes has claimed the lives of 90 Americans, 394 South Koreans, and at least 889 North Koreans.

Also called the Joint Security Area, Panmun- jom is little more than a collection of no-frills conference rooms bisected by the MDL. Here, 50 years ago, military representatives of China, North Korea, and the United Nations finalized the armistice agreement that stopped the Kore- an War. Today Panmunjom is the one place in the DMZ where delegates from North Korea and the UN Command force meet to discuss mili- tary, political, and logistical matters.

You might think, then, that Panmunjom is a decorous, grown-up place. Nope, says Lt. Chris Croninger of the UN Command force. “It’s like a schoolyard with two bullies poking each other in the eye.”

The rules of combat at Panmunjom empha- size mind games—psyching out the enemy. Each side blasts (Continued on page 24)

the DMZ region hosts about 350 rare red-crowned cranes, migrants from Siberia and northeast China who arrive in winter to feed in rice fields on the Cheorwon Plain (above). Anticipating a time when troops are withdrawn, conservationists lobby for wildlife sanctu- aries and peace parks along the border, unmarred by development for the past 50 years. White-crowned tourists visit the Third Tunnel (below), a North Korean infiltration route discovered in 1978 beneath the DMZ.

Kang Jo-Kyong, who

fled the North in 1947, weeps for the parents Tale mio) i [ale Malcmarc iim seen or heard fri since he came s

arating families. Here Kang visits Imjin- gak near the DMZ so “| can feel close to

my family.”

DUE NORTH

BY TOM O'NEILL

North Korea makes sure that tourists travel light. As the cruise ship Hyun- dai Seolbongho approached landfall on North Korea’s east coast, officials winnowed my belongings. No large camera lenses or tape recorders, no newspapers, maps, or cell phones. Photographer Mike Yamashita and I were entering a country that has closed itself off from the outside world, and all guests—especially Americans—are seen as potential troublemakers.

Four hours after leaving Sokcho, South Korea, the ship with its 340 pas- sengers docked at Kosong port. I had come for a three-day visit to Mount Kumgang, a sacred peak opened for tourism in 1998 by a North Korea desperate for foreign currency. All of us were intrigued by the chance to see a long-forbidden landscape and its people. Unfortunately the schedule con- fined us for much of the time in a tight bubble world created

22 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

by the Hyundai Corporation, the South Korean conglomerate that oper- ates the trip under the eye of North Korean authorities. Within that bub- ble I soaked in hot baths, marveled at a troupe of North Korean acrobats, and drank Viper’s Venom liquor at a tourists-only restaurant.

But I lived for the daily bus trip to the hiking paths, our only chance to witness scenes of everyday life. Through ten-foot barbed-wire fences lining the roads, we saw farmers harvesting rice by hand, men fording a river with bundles on their backs, families washing clothes in a stream. The scene was medieve

Only once, while hiking along a gorgeous jade green river in the Oknyudong Valley, did I actually meet a North Korean, a park ranger. He aggressively questioned me about U.S. designs in Korea. “We hate Amer-

ica,” he declared through my interpreter. “We are not evil, like your Pres- ident says.” His words rang in my head. Here is a nation of 23 million people who endure poverty and starvation in obedience to leaders who threaten nuclear attack as a way to win the world’s respect. North Korea, glimpsed so briefly, appeared profoundly beautiful, dangerous, and sad.

Tributes to the late Kim Il Sung, the first president of North Korea, appear nearly everywhere in the Mount Kumgang area. A poem to the “Great Leader” deco- rates a ing path (below). His image (bottom left) pro- vides a political backdrop for visiting South Koreans. For a change of scenery, tourists retreat to the hot spa (top left).

YANKEE GO HOME

Ringed by police, protesters charge the gates of Camp Casey, a U.S. Army base. Anti- American rallies broke out last fall after the acquittal of U.S. soldiers involved in the traf- fic deaths of two schoolgirls. Some 37,000 U.S. troops are stationed in South Korea.

(Continued from page 18) _ opposing hillsides with patriotic music and recorded messages. A giant signboard on the North Korean side warns—in Korean characters, which few of the Americans can read—“Yankee Go Home.” In one of the conference rooms North Koreans once sawed a few inches off chair legs so that their counterparts at the negotiating table would look small and silly. When North Koreans attended a meeting on another occasion with AK-47 assault r: obviously hidden under their jackets, an armistice violation, American officers chose not to confront them. Instead the Amer- icans took delight in jacking up the room’s heat to equatorial levels just so that they could see

24 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

ies, unwilling to expose their weap- ons, squirm and sweat in their heavy clothes. Lt. Charles Levine, a lanky South Carolinian who quit a rock band in 1998 and joined the Army, escorts me to Panmunjom to observe the mental war games. The occasion is a “body repatriation,” involving the remains of four North Koreans who have washed down rivers into the south. Were they fishermen, soldiers, spies? Levine won't say. watch from a window as Red Cross offi- cials from the South pass the coffins to soldiers from the North. But I hardly register the actual transfer. I can’t take my eyes off the North Korean guards staring at us through the windows, close enough for us to see the red Kim Jong II pins on their chests. Their hard stares unnerve me. “As a visitor you are not allowed to gesture at, or com- municate with, the North Koreans. They want to provoke incidents,” Lieutenant Levine has warned me. That doesn’t stop him from shoot- ing dark gl of his own. | also notice Major Kim, the South Korean officer I had interviewed,

toeing the Military Demar- cation Line—which here is a strip of concrete between the buildings—and glaring like a bad dream at the North Kore- an soldiers, who glare back. You wonder if they practice this stuff in front of a mirror. In fact, the soldiers at Pan- munjom are chosen for their intimidating appearance. The South Koreans here must stand at least five feet eight, two inches taller on average than their countrymen; a black belt in martial arts is also required. The Americans assigned to Panmunjom are plucked at airports from the batches of Gls arriving from overseas, selected for height—six feet or more is preferred—and for physical bearing. The North Korean sentinels are no slouches either—ramrod straight, steely eyed, and among the best fed people in their famine-threatened country.

utside the DMZ the big weapons come

into play. The mild-sounding Civilian

Control Zone, the 590-square-mile

restricted area that backs up the DMZ, is bristling with tanks, attack helicopters, rocket launchers, and swarms of soldiers on maneuvers. Inside the CCZ, I sometimes feel as if ’'ve stumbled onto a military coup in prog- ress. Tanks rumble down the main streets of small towns; infantrymen march along coun- try roads followed by jeeps carrying mounted machine guns; soldiers watch from foxholes. No one waves.

Troops and weaponry are concentrated in the farming country north of Seoul, both inside and out of the CCZ, in what are called the Munsan and Cheorwon invasion corridors—broad ave- nues of level ground that for centuries have served as attack routes to the south. The view from a Black Hawk transport helicopter reveals South Korean Army camps and weapons depots stashed in almost every draw and valley along the edges of the ancient war corridor. The 15,000

US. soldiers with the Second Infantry Division are also dug in here, spread out at 17 camps.

For a week U.S. Army personnel whisk pho- tographer Mike Yamashita and me around by van, jeep, and helicopter to see the troops in dress rehearsals for war. One night I watch from a hill- top as sleek Apache helicopters with antitank missiles hover over a village and shoot targets with laser gear. On another day medics practice carrying stretchers under barbed wire as snip- ers fire on them.

The most intense exercise involves more than 600 soldiers from the 506th Infantry Battalion at Camp Greaves, who are conducting a mock air assault inside the CCZ. Black Hawks drop the troops at night into what the officers called “dinosaur country”—rough, up-and-down ter- rain—where the men have to clear the high ground of enemy forces (convincingly played by U.S. soldiers with their uniforms turned inside out). A few hours after dawn, a firefight (with blanks) erupts on a nearby hillside. Screams and curses tear through the air as a platoon leader tries to direct his men. Mortars boom and yel- low clouds from smoke bombs drift over a greenhouse, flushing out a farmer, a real one, who wants to see why all hell is breaking loose.

No one pays the exasperated farmer any attention. To the soldiers, all civilians look out of place in the security zones, pieces of geogra- phy defined and controlled by the military. To the generals the terrain represents a battlefield, pure and simple. Ridgelines offer strategic points from which to shell the enemy. Valleys are inva- sion routes for tanks. Rivers act as barriers.

In recent times, however, new sets of eyes, civilian eyes, are looking more closely at the DMZ landscape and seeing a very different kind of place. Elderly South Koreans come on weekends to the Freedom Bridge above the Imjin River and gaze longingly across the DMZ to the nearby mountains of North Korea. They see a homeland.

The Korean War split the families of more than seven million people, many of whom fled south during the conflict to escape communist rule. Since 1953 all communication—via mail, phone, or travel—has been cut off by the North. Following a historic summit meeting in 2000, leaders of the two Koreas have allowed brief, emotional reunions for 1,200 families. Over 100,000 others have their names on waiting lists. An almost tribal desire for reunification now

KOREA’S DMZ 25

permeates South Korean society, a legacy of the 13 centuries, ending in 1945, that Korea enjoyed as a unified political entity.

This longing for reunification reaches even to guard posts in the DMZ. In the central moun- tains, Sgt. Kim Seung Whan, his face streaked with war paint from martial-arts practice, admits that he is uneasy about the prospect of fighting North Koreans. “They are our broth- ers,” he says, “and yet they are our enemies. It is heartbreaking.”

The state of war can seem weirdly unreal, as if the soldiers are actors at a historical

theme park—call it WarLand.

Entrepreneurs also eye the DMZ, scanning the lowlands on the peninsula’s west and east coasts and seeing corridors for trade and tour- ism. Recently, both governments have cleared minefields inside the DMZ for two north-south railways closed since the war. In February the first cross-border road in 50 years opened to take South Korean tourists to visit Mount Kumgang, a cluster of sacred peaks in the North (see story on pages 22-3).

But the most compelling—and dreamy— vision belongs to conservationists. They look at the wetlands of five rivers crossing the DMZ, and at the Taebaek Mountains, a steep forested maze of 5,000-foot peaks near the east coast, and they see international peace parks, ecosystem preserves, and wildlife sanctuaries.

One of the few good things to come from Ko- rea’s 50-year standoff, the security shield erected around the DMZ and its buffer zones has inad- vertently preserved the largest piece of undevel- oped land—more than 960 square miles—in all of South Korea, one of the world’s most densely settled countries. Most of the wilderness remains off-limits, however. To see the DM2Z’s star wild- life attractions—two species of rare Asian cranes that winter in the Cheorwon Basin—visitors first must apply to the military for permission.

Until tensions ease on the border, which seems a very distant prospect, the only powerful bin- oculars allowed inside the DMZ will belong not to bird-watchers but to soldiers manning hun- dreds of guard posts. On a wind-ripped moun- taintop in the central DMZ, a South Korean officer hands me his field glasses so I can watch

26 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

the movements of two North Korean soldiers who have emerged from their guard tower. “They don’t have any heat,” the officer says. “I think they came outside to get warm in the sun.”

In these same mountains a force of one, an amateur wildlife biologist named Lim Sun Nam, helps me finally to see the DMZ as something other than an armed camp. For the past five years Lim, a former TV cameraman, has pur- sued a quixotic mission to prove the existence in South Korea of the Siberian tiger, the tradi- tional symbol of unified Korea. Tigers officially have been absent from the south- ern peninsula for at least half a century. But from months of camping and hiking solo in the high country north of Hwacheon, only a few miles south of the DMZ, Lim has found pro- vocative clues: tigerlike prints patterning the snow, tree trunks shredded by large claws, the remains of pigs and cows mauled by a powerful predator, accounts from villagers of hearing roars “like a motorcycle revving.”

Lim, a short, powerful man with an Army- style flattop, hurries up a steep hillside, racing the falling sun so he can change the film and bat- tery on a motion-sensing camera. He has posi- tioned it close to where he found several torn-up cows. Lim does not doubt that a family of tigers lives in these mountains. His dream is to con- vince the military to open a 500-yard-wide gap in the DMZ fence to allow tiger populations from the north and south to meet and breed. But first he must see a tiger and take its picture.

Lim’s stories about tigers and their hunting prowess spook me in the gathering dark, my nerves already frayed from living for weeks in the tense surroundings of the DMZ. As Lim camou- flages his camera, a bright glow appears at the brow of the hill.

“It’s a searchlight,” I gasp, certain that the mil- itary has arrived on yet another nighttime ma- neuver. “No, friend,” Lim laughs, “that’s just the rising of the moon.” And suddenly I for- get about the DMZ. Tonight we're in tiger country. We're in wil- derness. Tonight, for only a moment, we're in a peaceful place. 0

Join our DMZ forum, or watch footage of tank maneuvers, Apache helicopters, and the world’s most dangerous golf course at nationalgeograph ic.com/ngm/0307.

of war and peace along the South Korean DMZ reveal a country torn over how to deal with its neighbor to the north. Tanks on a training mission (above) cross a river near Seoul, which North Korea has threatened to turn into a “lake of fire.” Despite such tensions, both sides recently signed an agreement to reopen two railways across the border. To cele- brate the pact, youngsters representing the two Koreas embrace outside the South’s DMZ fence (below), a tiny step toward healing a divided land.

3

something intheair —

His nose knows when she's in estrus. A female lion gives off pherom n from anal glands . that advertise her sexual readiness. She'll reject males that don't im s her but may also take multiple partners to nab the fittest father for her cubs. Big, plush ma em to make

an impression, as do males bold enough to fight for the lion pride.

PANTHERA LEO, GABRIELA STAEBLER, WILDLIFE PHOTOGRAPHY

Black grouse males (below) spar with gusto to win mating territory. A pheasant (bottom) offers up a vigorous solo performance. A male peacock’s unwieldy outfit suggests he's robust—or it may just look sexy; regardless, females prefer elaborate, heavily spotted trains. For boobies,

color coordination is key. A blue-footed pair parades in webbed clown shoes.

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: LYRURUS TETRIX, KONRAD WOTHE; PAVO CRISTATUS, INGO ARNDT; SULA NEBOUXII, TU! DE ROY, MINDEN PICTURES. PHASIANUS COLCHICUS, MANFRED DANEGGER

t’s a blustery spring day in the Australian outback, the kind that makes you think rain must be on the way, although there hasn’t been a drop in months, and the ground is brown and parched. In some animals, frogs for instance, a dry spring can slow down or stop altogether the normal,

romantic inclinations that come this time of

year. But the lack of rain hasn't deterred the male spotted bowerbirds.

Under old peppertrees, thornbushes, and stands of oleanders, they’ve built elaborate U-shaped arenas of dried grasses, 12 to 14 inches high and 12 to 20 inches long. They’ve decorated them with piles of sun-bleached sheep verte- brae, shiny aluminum foil, pop-tops from beer cans, shards of broken windshield glass, and lit- tle strips of red and blue plastic. The fanciest bowers feature special, seductive tidbits: a silver fork, the shoe token from a Monopoly game, old

gun shell casings, red, blue, and purple glass of

the deepest hues. The birds have arranged their treasures with an eye to the light—how does that bone pile look when the morning sun hits it?— and to their symmetry: silver metal hoops of unknown origin, for example, placed at equal distances from opposite ends of the bower. Now a male can do little more than watch and wait. If he’s built a good bower, then he'll suc- ceed in life’s ultimate contest and win the top prize: a female who chooses him as a mate. “That’s really what it comes down to,” says Gerry Borgia, an evolutionary biologist who has studied the mating behaviors of bowerbirds for 23 years. “So you wonder sometimes when you see poorly built bowers,” he says, pointing to one in disarray. “You want to say to the guy: ‘Hey! This is about your reproductive success! Get

moving! Straighten those straws! Find some more bones! Why be a C student?”

Their wild breeding antics led to the phrase “mad as a March hare.” Receptive for just a few hours every six weeks, female European hares nearly take flight, fending off overeager males with leaps and bounds. A doe’s final pick during her tiny window of estrus is often the most persistent male of the bunch, a healthy hare refusing to give up the chase.

34 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

LEPUS EUROPAEUS, MANFRED DANEGGER

Borgia, a hefty, middle-aged man with a broad, gap-toothed smile, bends over a video camera he’s placed a short distance from the bower and changes the tape. He’s stationed similar cameras with microphones at 22 bowers scattered across the sheep and cattle stations near the sleepy town of Nyngan. The cameras are equipped with motion-detection sensors and record whatever the male birds—or their female visitors—do within the bowers. Later, in his University of Maryland lab, Borgia’s students will review the tapes, picking out the ones that show what male bowerbirds might dream about: a female enter- ing the straw bower, watching the male perform and sing for her, and, if she is well pleased, accepting him as a mate. Borgia isn’t sentimental about this latter event, referring to it simply as a “cop”—short for copulation.

“You watch enough of these cops, and you begin to get a feel for why the female chooses one male and not another,” he explains. “It’s my guess that this guy isn’t going to do well. I mean, that’s pathetic,” he says, wav- ing his hand at the bird’s puny pile of vertebrae. “And the thing is, he took over this site from an older male who died, but who had a great bower with lots of bones. And they’re still here! This new guy just hasn’t made the effort to move them to his bower.”

Borgia shakes his head like a teacher who can’t figure out why some kid who has every- thing handed to him on a platter would still choose to fail. “He’s probably not getting any cops this year,” the professor says, assigning the bird to possible evolutionary oblivion.

As if in protest, the male, a blue-jay-size bird colored beige and brown, squawks at us from a nearby eucalyptus tree. He rasps out a long series of skraas, then changes to the snarling, spitting sound of a cornered cat, and ends with a laughing call that sounds like a kookaburra.

“He’s trying to scare us,” Borgia says. “They're great imitators—cats, hawks, kids crying. They use that skraa call in their courtship displays too, so there must be something about it that allows females to find genetically superior males. But he’s got a lot to learn about how to build a bower, one that will attract the females and get him some action.”

The most successful males are about ten years

36 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

territorial tenors

From the mouths of males come cries of warning. Red deer hold their claim to hard- won harems with bellowing roars—sometimes 3,000 a day. Their defensive calls are also music to uncommitted females, luring them to join the herd and bringing them into heat. No less effective despite the four-inch source, the shrill territorial squeal of the northern grasshopper mouse reaches ears 300 feet away.

ONYCHOMYS TORRIDUS, MICHAEL FOGDEN, BRUCE COLEMAN INC, (ABOVE); CERVUS ELAPHUS, JOHN CANCALOS!

le a

38 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003 CAPRA PYRENAICA VICTORIAE, JORGE SIERRA

reproductive success! Get moving! Why be aC student?”’

old and have spent some five lonely bachelor years perfecting their skills. In this species (as with most birds), a male can’t force a female to mate, Like a solo rock star, he must devise a bower, song, and dance that wows the gals. Among bowerbirds and most other animals as well, it’s the females that do the choosing.

From fruit flies to elephants, females pick the male (or males) with which they want to mate. The males, in turn, compete with each other to get a female’s attention, each vying to show her that he will be the best sperm donor for her babies. That is why, evolutionary biologists say, males are most often the ornamented sex. It is why the male peacock unfurls his dazzling train, why male guppies are adorned with bright orange and blue spots, why male frogs call and male canaries sing. It is even why the genita- lia of many males, particularly insects, are as fancy as an Aborigine’s embellished didgeridoo, with accoutrements far beyond what’s required to get the job done.

“Basically, the male wants access to the female’s eggs,” explains William Eberhard, an evolution- ary biologist at the University of Costa Rica. “And he'll do whatever it takes to please her. But it’s her game; she sets the rules. And she makes the choice.”

harles Darwin was the first scientist to devise a theory of sexual selection and to recognize that females frequently select mates. He began to develop the notion while writing On the Origin of Species, in which he argued that the related theory of natural selection is the primary force in the evolution of all organisms. Natural selection goes far in explaining why one individual animal survives to pass on its genes to the next generation, while another dies

Tongue flicking and horns back in a gesture of peace, a male ibex courts with a low stretch

and leg raise, coaxing the female to turn so he can test her scent for signs of estrus. “He'll taste her urine, breathing it in as when one tests wine quality,” says ibex ecologist Inma Alados.

If his advances are tolerated, “he'll persist with chasing and mounting.”

ANIMAL ATTRACTION 39

leaving no descendants. It is why female birds are often drably colored (to hide from predators when incubating their eggs), and why gazelles are built for speed (to outrun their enemies). But natural selection does not explain features that would seem to hinder an animal’s survival, such as the male peacock’s extravagant plumage or a male elk’s heavy and unwieldy antlers. How did such unlikely traits—ones that seem to run counter to every Darwinian rule for staying alive—come about? Even Darwin struggled to find a reason, once writing to a friend, “The sight of a feather in a peacock’s tail makes me sick!”

Eventually Darwin devised a solution, ex- plaining in his 1871 book, The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex, that males’ bright colors, baroque ornaments, and elaborate songs are the result of a process he named sexual selection. According to Darwin, sexual selection shapes species in two ways— by giving rise to competition among males for mates, and via females’ deci- sions to mate with particular males.

Darwin’s fellow evolutionists readily accepted the part of the sexual selection theory suggesting that male competi- tion plays a role in evolution. Many males are equipped with horns and ant- lers or other weapons, while females are not, and it’s easy to see that a male elk with a large rack would have an advan- tage over his rivals. He could use his ant- lers to defeat his competitors and mate with more females. And that would give him the chance to have more sons that would inherit his genes for big antlers and his abilities both to defeat other males and inseminate many females.

But the part of the theory suggesting that females choose mates—thus shaping male phys- iology and behavior and influencing a species’ evolution—was immediately attacked from

all sides. Another proponent of the theory of

evolution, Alfred Russel Wallace, particularly despised the notion and actively lobbied against it. He argued that males were brightly colored and given to song because of their “superabun- dant energy” during the mating season. For Wallace, natural selection covered everything, including male competition. And he found the idea that females choose mates because they prefer a particular color or ornament ludicrous

40 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

enticing tokens

Some males must give a little to get a little. A weaverbird (above) builds a nest of greens (old brown grass won't do), then clings to his new abode shrieking and fluttering, await- ing female approval. A gos- hawk male brings home dinner (a jay) for his mate; she'll later initiate copulation as if reward- ing his hunting prowess.

PHILETAIRUS SOCIUS, ANUP SHAH AND MANOJ SHAH (ABOVE):

ACCIPITE

GENTIUS,

KARI REPONEN

protecting their interests

Post-coitus, two male damselflies stick around. Hovering overhead, they clamp on to egg-laying females to ensure their own sperm isn’t snatched out and replaced by a competitor’s (the dam- selfly penis is equipped for such a swap). Hanging on for an hour or so, the males risk becoming prey on the open water but increase their chances of passing on their genes,

ERVTHROMMA VIRIDULUM, THOMAS ENDLEIN

because it suggested a faculty for taste and dis-

crimination that he believed to be beyond most animals. Throughout most of the 20th century Wallace’s opinion prevailed, and Darwin’s

theory of sexual selection, with its offshoot of

female choice, was largely ignored.

“Right into the 1970s people were still laugh- ing at the idea of female choice,” says Michael Ryan, an evolutionary biologist at the Univer- sity of Texas in Austin. “One writer even said

And they’ve discovered that the females of numerous invertebrates are equipped with sperm storage organs, special pockets where they hold the male’s fluid, perhaps assessing its quality. Scientists speculate that the females may nurture the sperm if they accept the con- tribution, or destroy them if not.

he biggest boost to the theory of female choice came from a highly influential paper written by evolutionist Robert Trivers in 1972. Reproduction is not an equal equation, said Trivers. Males and females invest different amounts of energy and resources into producing offspring. Males produce many relatively cheap sperm, but females make a set number of expen- sive eggs. So it makes sense that males compete for access to females, and that females are choosy about the male, or males, they let fertilize them. The big question then becomes: What do the females want?

The genitalia of many males, particularly insects, are

that all you had to do was look at our own spe- cies to see that females had no input whatsoever in mating decisions. Now, of course, we have tons of examples that show that Darwin was right: It’s most often the females that choose.”

Indeed, these days scientific journals are packed with papers on sexual selection and mate choice. In their search to understand how and what females choose, scientists have uncov- ered an entirely new world of the startling and steamy: Fruit flies that (for their tiny body size) produce some of the largest sperm in the animal kingdom; male millipedes with special

legs that exist solely to rhythmically massage a female’s reproductive tract, apparently a stim- ulation she needs before allowing him to inseminate her; a protein in a male mouse’s saliva that tells a female mouse if he’s Mr. Right.

Some researchers have speculated that a male’s ornaments and vocal beguilements carry infor- mation about the quality of his genes, or his immune system, or his parenting abilities. Others have suggested that there is little information in these secondary sexual traits; they exist solely to attract the female. If she chooses a mate that other females regard as handsome, she'll pro-

duce attractive, sexy sons who are more likely themselves to be chosen as mates, and so pass on her genes.

Michael Ryan contends that although the male’s trait itself—the color he displays or the sound he makes—may be arbitrary, there’s def- initely a reason for the female’s choice. “It’s gen- erally something that the male has hit on that stimulates something in the female’s neurons,” says Ryan, who has subjected a variety of spe- cies to mate-choice experiments devised to get a female to tell all.

Ryan leads the way into a lab where a walnut size female Tungara frog swollen with eggs is about to take such a test. In the wilds of the Tungara frog’s native Panama, Ryan explains, the males gather in small pools to belt out two-part calls: one part a deep chuck sound and the other a higher pitched whine. The females hear potential consorts and swim to the ones

TEGENARIA SIPHONAPTERA

MESTICA, SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, PHOTO RESEARCHERS (TOP): H. KJELDSE PHOTO LIBRARY, PHOTO RESEARCHERS.

N, SCIENC

they choose. A selected male climbs aboard a female’s back, and she carries him off to fertil- ize the eggs she will eject.

“The whine portion of the call identifies the species,” says Ryan, in essence telling the female, “Pm a male Physalaemus pustulosus.” And the chuck indicates the male’s size. “Bigger males make deeper chucks,” he says. “Females prefer the males with the deepest chucks.” Deepest chuck, biggest male, most sperm: By choosing him, a female has the best chance that all of her eggs will be fertilized.

But that’s not the end of the story. A lone male with no competition may not make the chuck call; he may only make the whine and still get a female. Not until other males show up does he add his deep-throated love tone. The reason is that the love song has a mixed blessing: Female frogs aren't the only ones listening for big males. Bats, opossums, and other predators are too.

“It's a good example of the dilemma males

predator problem faced by male Tungara frogs. “This is what you and I see,” Cummings explains, setting a photograph of a gray-black fish on a table. “And this is pretty close to what a female X. multilineatus sees,” she says, setting a second photograph, taken under UV light, next to the first. The tail shines with silvery discs and streaks.

It turns out that swordtails can see in the UV light range, but, like us, their predators cannot. So the male swordtails seem to have evolved a

as fancy as an Aborigine’s embellished didgeridoo.

can face,” Ryan says. “If a male has to compete with other males to get a female, he must make the chuck call. But the call puts him at risk of being eaten, and thereby removed from the gene pool altogether.”

Despite the dilemma of the love song, it’s clear what a female Tungara frog is looking for: the biggest male, who can fertilize the most eggs. But sometimes scientists are less sure of what a male characteristic might be saying to a female. Ryan and graduate student Molly Cummings have studied a Mexican swordtail fish, Xipho- phorus multilineatus, and found that females prefer males with shiny tails.

“We haven't figured out what that shine tells the female about the male,” says Cummings, “but females seem to like the brightest males.”

One thing the shine does do is sidestep the

Magnification reveals genital extravagance. Clockwise from top left: The male house spider stimulates and inseminates with pedipalps (claw-like frontal appendages). A bean weevil’s penis abrades: Spikes hold it inside the female and also tear tissue, perhaps discouraging future matings. A bedbug’s penile “hook” is a sperm-filled syringe, while a flea’s exuberant organ is rigged with a gentle stimulator.

CALLOSOBRUCHUS MACULATUS (TOP), CIMICIDAE (BOTTOM). ANDREW SYRED, PHOTO RESEARCHERS

less risky way of saying to their females: “Look at me. I’m the best.”

In other cases, researchers have a clearer idea of what male coloring tells a female. In a species of guppies named Poecilia reticulata, successful males generally have richly colored red-orange spots and stripes along their sides, says Greg Grether, an evolutionary biologist at the Uni- versity of California, Los Angeles. “They can’t make that color without eating a particular orange fruit that’s desirable but fairly rare in their native streams in Trinidad,” he explains. “So the orange may indicate which males are best at finding the fruit or at outcompeting other males to get to it first.”

Scientists have even succeeded in decipher- ing the message a female reads in a male pea- cock’s train. In a study that surely would have

cured Darwin of his loathing for peacock feath- ers, biologist Marion Petrie showed that the best dads were indeed the fanciest ones. Their chicks weighed more at birth than did the others, and those same chicks were better at evading predators.

arwin postulated that female choice not only could change the characteristics of a given species, but also lead to the crea- tion of new species entirely. Studies of such spe- cies as the giant-sperm fruit fly, Drosophila mojavensis, may explain how this can happen.

In her University of Arizona laboratory in Tucson, Therese Markow uncorks a glass vial containing dozens of male fruit flies living on a bit of lab cul- ture. She drops in a short rubber aspirator, takes aim, sucks up a few flies, and transfers them to another vial containing females.

For a few seconds the males simply sit and preen. Then one of the males moves toward a female and pulls his wing to one side, producing a soft buzzing sound.

“OK, he’s starting his mating song,” says Markow. “If she likes him, she'll sing back.”

Like voyeurs, we watch the couple in the glass vial intently.

“Well, she doesn’t like him,” Markow laughs. “She’s not singing back.”

The male persists, now vigorously scissoring both wings; the female remains unimpressed. “Now she’s singing her ‘I don’t want you’ song,” says Markow. “That poor little male; he’s just singing his heart out for her.”

Behind them, closer to the end of the vial, another female does scissor her wings in accep- tance, and the male mounts her.

“These flies are from the same D. mojavensis population so that’s what I would expect to see: Even though one female says no, another says yes pretty quickly,” says Markow.

But when the males and females come from D. mojavensis populations that are geographi- cally separate, the females of one group rarely accept the males of the other group, even though they are members of the same species. In the wild, D. mojavensis lives in rotting cactuses in both mainland Mexico and Baja California,

46 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

foes for love

Male zebras in territorial disputes posture and stomp, then assault with tearing bites and brutal kicks. Access to breeding females is the prize. Battles between diamondback rattlers are more dance than clash: Males snake in sync with heads high, then entwine in a muscular wrestling

match until one is pinned.

CROTALUS ATROX, R. J. SMALL AND VIRGINIA SMALL, RICK POLEY PHOTOGRAPHY (ABOVE); EQUUS QUAGGA, ROBERT WONG

“Basically, the male wants access to the female’s eggs.

separated by the Gulf of California. “The two groups can mate and produce viable offspring,” says Markow. “But the females prefer not to. So I think what we're seeing is a new species in the making.” The initial separation may have been triggered by the Gulf of California, a natural bar- rier that keeps the two populations apart, “but female choice maintains and reinforces that division,” Markow explains.

Such simple preferences on the part of females —for a male of a certain color or shape, or from a particular population—are now thought to be the primary cause for the diversity of wildly dec- orated jumping spiders found in the Sky Island mountains near Tucson, Arizona, and for the even greater variety of cichlid fishes in Africa’s Lake Malawi.

“There’s no question that Darwin was right about the power of female choice,” says Markow. “Tt can shape males and it can make new species.”

nd what is it like to be the waiting male, a to be Mr. Lonely Heart? To find out, I set

up a blind close to the bower of one of Borgia’s spotted bowerbirds, a male the scien- tist says was the “big scorer” the previous year. Borgia has named each bird for the location of its bower. This top bird has built its mating arena in the shade of two old peppertrees on the Gerar Station, and so is dubbed “Gerar Pepper Bower.” I nickname him “G.P.”

Unlike the bower of the C student, G.P’s is a sturdy, handsome structure, its decorations art- fully arranged, its straw walls thick and sym- metrical. In the center he has piled shattered bits of windshield glass, each piece about a half inch in diameter. When the sun hits them, they glitter like diamonds. He’s hung some bits of metal wire and a strip of red plastic along the bower’s walls and stacked a long, thick wall of sheep vertebrae

With unusual violence, a king keeps his title with a fatal, skull-crushing bite to a rival. More often, male lions chase foes away without serious injury, though invaders can pose a big threat by killing the pride’s cubs (which brings females into estrus). Top males must possess extraordinary virility, as lionesses may require hundreds of bouts of mating to get pregnant.

48 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003 PANTHERA LEO, MITSUAKI IWAGO

just beyond one end. At the opposite end lies an equally large pile of clear and colored glass, sprinkled with a few shell casings and alumi- num pop-tops. Other smaller piles of glass and odd pieces of aluminum foil and plastic lie scat- tered in a mosaic pattern around the bower, some as far away as four feet.

“Oh yes, all that is part of his display,” Borgia says, when I ask about some seemingly random bits of glass. “Everything here that’s not natural is part of his bower.”

A male can build a straw bower in the space of a few days. Decorating it, however, takes several additional days, and getting the ornaments in the right place can take years. Spotted bowerbirds build their bowers anew each year, usually locating them close to those of the preceding mating sea- son. And when an older bird dies, a younger one—perhaps a son or other close male relative—takes over his locality and his treasures.

“All these decorations, what the males choose and how they place them, is driven by female choice,’ Bor- gia says. “In a small way, they're like us: The male’s ornaments aren’t necessarily a physical part of him, but are more in the things he acquires.”

Indeed, the male and female birds look very much alike—brownish and speckled with gold- en dots, a spray of bubble-gum-pink feathers on the back of their necks. These are usually hid- den from view, but males and females unfurl them in times of aggression, and the male also fans them out when courting a female or when practicing his mating show.

I saw many such practice runs over the next four days. Sometimes G.P. perched on a branch beside his bower and rehearsed his screechy love songs, which resembled the harsh blast of steam from a cappuccino machine. Sometimes he walked the short length of his straw bower, licking every individual straw to leave behind traces of his saliva. Or he would rearrange a pop- top here, a plastic ring there, or drop one of his shell casings on the pile of glass, then cock his head to listen to the pretty ching it made. I imagined he would like to make that sound for a female.

Sometimes one or two other males arrived to check out the competition or to try to steal one of G.P’s objets d’art. But he was vigorous in

50 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

slippery embrace

Cupid's got nothing on garden snails. These hermaphrodites (each is both male and female) pierce each other with calcif- erous arrows that carry a chemical request for sperms’ safe entry. They'll even line up for a threesome. Anacondas prefer orgies: In a weeks- long session, a female ina twisting mass of perhaps

ten males will allow multiple inseminations, boosting her overall reproductive success.

HELIX ASPERSA, MANFRED DANEGGER (ABOVE); EUNECTES MURINUS, TONY CROCETTA, BIOS

choose me Wings outstretched and beak to the Galapagos sky, a male albatross regales an attentive female

with an ancient dance. Other males may cut in to try to woo her away. She'll pick her favorite from the flock and join the ritual, bowing and flapping in reply.

DIOMEDEA, GRAHAM ROBERTSON.

‘ee ie

ea” ——————— a y , P a Pe _pe ‘ eae ~ « $ A Pr y \ = _ enna _ Ph

defense of his bower and belongings, and flew at them with beak and tongue out, claws ready to strike.

One afternoon, after another long, lonely day, G.P. picked up a bunch of green pepper berries, fluffed up his pink topnotch, and raced around and through his bower, screeching and clucking and looking rather ridiculous, like any poor soul waiting for the phone to ring. Alas, | was the only female in view.

Or maybe not. Perhaps another one—one of his own species—was watching from the safety of a nearby eucalyptus. Young females may make multiple visits to several bowers, studying them and the males, learning, Borgia thinks, how to choose. They get nothing from the male beyond his genes; he does not help to raise the chicks. Nor do females appear to mate with more than one male in one season. “She studies them and makes a choice,” says Borgia, “and if she’s happy, she'll return to the same male the next year.”

Were none of the females watching G.P. pleased enough? Or was it merely a slow period in the season? The wind blew steadily most afternoons, and G.P. often flew away when it started to kick up, apparently deciding it wasn’t worth his time to wait.

And then, on the fourth morning, a female appeared. She perched on the branch beside the bower for a minute, then hopped right inside. G.P. went berserk, squawking and fluffing and racing around his bower. He stopped at one end and picked up a pop-top to show her, then dropped it and did another lap around the bower. She just watched. Then she began to lower herself, ever so slightly lifting her tail, tipping her head forward. Borgia had told me that was the “choice” sign, and I held my breath.

G.P. screeched even louder and hopped toward her. And at that very instant, another male appeared. Romance gave way to a brawl, and the female flew away.

But I was sure she had made her choice. She would be back, and G.P. would get another chance to keep his genes at play in the game of life. 0

Read the author's tales from

the field, find more photo- graphs, and check into additional resources and links at nationalgeo graphic.com/ngm/0307.

54 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

stuck with him

Second thoughts? It’s too late, at least for devoted anglerfish. A male (above), lucking upon a mate in the deep ocean, gloms on to her much larger body

for keeps, pilfering nutrients from her blood while fertilizing her eggs. So how do bears pick partners? “Size does matter,” says Minnesota biologist Craig Packer, though more for male competition than female pref- erence. In the end, whether bulky or tiny, leggy or finned, the fittest prevail.

HISTRIO HISTRIO, DARLYNE A. MURAWSKI, IMAGE COLLECTION {ABOVE}; URSUS MIDDENDORFFi, DANIEL J, COX, NATURAL EXPOSURES,

| WHILE WAR AND REVOLUTION TRANSFORMED 20TH-CENTURY CHINA, ARCHAEOLOGISTS WERE PROBING THE NATION’S ROOTS. UP CAME HARD EVIDENCE OF THE SEEMINGLY MYTHICAL SHANG DYNASTY —AND BRONZE AGE

| CULTURES NO ONE HAD

| DREAMED OF.

3,200-year-old bronze head from Sanxingdui SANXINGDU! MUSEUN, GUANGHAN, WIOTH 7 INCHES

Life could be bputal under crag rule.

Human skulls discovered in a pit during excava-

tions of an early Shang capital at the modern

city of Zhengzhou same from ritual human

sacrifices, possibly wareaptiyes. The Shang _

commonly sacrificed bt S the spirits of ;

their ancestors or # deit fre— perhaps

more than 13,000 duringsth years

the dynasty alone.

BY PETER HESSLER

PHOTOGRAPHS BY O. Louis MAZZATENTA

ART BY HONGNIAN ZHANG

rialists during their occupation in the 1930s.

the tomb and the town, there’s an old airstrip that was built by Japanese impe-

Directly beneath the Japanese airstrip, an entire city had waited for over

3,000 years to be rediscovered. When I first visited in September 2000, the

underground city was poised to reappear as one of China’s most significant

haeological discoveries.

hun Jing wasn’t in a hurry. The 36-year-old, as degrees in archaeology and geology from uni- sities in China and the United States, moved to his rhythms. He was careful, precise. He smiled easily. His open face was a work of simple geometry: round ead , round cheeks, round-rimmed glasses.

“You have to look at the landscape in a dynamic way,”

he told me, as we walked through recently harvested stalks

62 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

Living link to the first Shang excavations, archae-

ologist Shih Chang-

ju (holding a 1930s

photo of himself

in Anyang) fled to Taiwan in 1949. Now 100, he still focuses on his work: “My

job isn’t done yet.”

of corn that bordered the old airfield. “It might be completely different now from what it was 3,000 years ago.”

Beneath our feet the earth was riddled with tiny holes, the work of a joint project of the In- stitute of Archaeology at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the University of Minne- sota, with support from the National Geographic Society. The holes were about two inches in diameter, and they had been dug with Luoyang spades—a tubular blade attached to a long pole. Each hole extended straight down for more than eight feet, deep enough to extract sediment cores containing traces of buried man-made features. At a glance, archaeologists can “read” such cores and tell whether they are standing above a bur- ied wall, a tomb, or a rubbish pit.

Jing and the others called this site Huanbei Shang City. Since 1996, when a systematic sur- vey revealed evidence of a buried settlement, they had been mapping it with Luoyang spades, and by 1999 they had traced the city wall, which encloses an area of nearly two square miles. The site dates from roughly the 14th century B.c., during the peak of the Shang culture that flour- ished on the Yellow River plain from about 1600 to 1045 B.c. Because Huanbei might be the area’s first urban settlement, archaeologists see it as a rare opportunity to trace the early stages of civ- ilization in China.

Huanbei also represents the latest chapter in the rediscovery of the Shang and other Bronze Age cultures. A hundred years ago the Shang dynasty was as lost as this ancient city, exist- ing only in historical texts that dated from the Zhou dynasty—hundreds of years after the Shang fell. While most Chinese scholars tradi- tionally accepted such sources, Westerners often dismissed them as mythical.

But over the course of the 20th century, the Shang steadily reappeared, the myths replaced by tangible artifacts: massive bronzes, eloquent oracle bones, burial complexes where thousands of people had been sacrificed to a hungry faith. China’s recorded history starts with the Shang: Their writing is the earliest known script in East Asia. And history always seems to return to the Shang, because the search for this ancient cul- ture has been shaped in part by the trials of modern China. Archaeologists like Jing uncover not only artifacts but also the subtle interplay between past and present.

64 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

Jing paused in the middle of the pockmarked field. He told me that in other parts of China archaeologists can recognize features on the horizon: a hill may represent a burial mound, and a ridge might reflect an old wall. But in this corner of Henan Province, river floods and redeposited loess soil have buried the past deep beneath the surface.

“We're looking at human society in three dimensions,” Jing said. “It’s not just the surface that matters. We had to add a third dimension: the time dimension.” He squinted into the dis- tance: cornstalks, soybean fields, parasol trees. Peasants working steadily. “You can look all around and see nothing,” he continued. “But in fact this was the first city in the area. If you don’t add time, you'll find nothing.”

THE REDISCOVERY HANG

MALARIA. THAT AT LEAST, IS THE LEG END. In 1899 a sick member of

Wang Yirong’s family sent out to a pharmacist for turtle plastrons—the ventral shells—that could be used to make traditional Chinese med- icine. Before the shells were ground up, some- body in the family noticed that they were inscribed with strange characters that resembled written Chinese.

Ever since, historians have argued about whether the tale is true. But there’s no doubt that Wang Yirong, an expert in ancient Chinese texts, became the first major collector of the in- scribed shells, called oracle bones, which he pur- chased from pharmacies. To the average literate Chinese, the oracle bone characters were at first glance unintelligible, but classical scholars like Wang immediately recognized them as an early form of the Chinese script. Wang's scholarship came to an abrupt end in 1900, when the Boxer Uprising raged across the nation in protest of foreign occupation of Chinese territories. Wang, who was a Qing dynasty government official, reluctantly accepted the command of some of the Boxer forces. On August 14, when European, US., and Japanese troops entered Beijing to put down the Boxers, Wang committed suicide by drinking poison and jumping down a well.

For years after Wang's death it seemed as if the objects—which were described by pharmacists as “dragon bones”—were anything but healing. Scholars bickered over their authenticity, and dealers tried to maintain a monopoly by lying about the source, which was a small village out- side Anyang called Xiaotun. Villagers in Xiaotun became so obsessed by the dragon bone trade that they engaged in fights and lawsuits. For- geries flooded the antiquities markets in Beijing and Shanghai.

But behind the chaos, the Chinese intellec- tual climate was undergoing revolutionary changes that allowed the oracle bones to be viewed in a new light. After the Qing fell at the end of 1911, intellectuals began calling for China to embrace Western science and

TAIWAN

Ok 400

‘SOURCE: ZHICHUN JING, UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA NG MAPS

THE CULTURAL FONT for China’s 4,000-year- old civilization was long argued to be the Yellow River. Excavation of magnificent bronzes and other Shang artifacts in the early 20th century supported this tradition. But in 1986, bronzes dating from the Shang era but of a stunningly different style emerged to the southwest in

the village of Sanxingdui. These and other Bronze Age finds suggest that ancient China had not one cultural center, but many.

philosophy. Realizing

™ SOCIETY GRANT

that archaeology could =| ——___

provide a fresh per- Research Committee proj- . ects are supported by

oF aS pe your Soclety membership.

demia Sinica sent an excavation team to Xiaotun in 1928—a project that trained a generation of Chinese archaeologists.

The earliest digs, which followed in the tracks of looters and dealers, focused on retrieving ora- cle bones. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, as more than 100,000 inscribed fragments came to light, the once mythical Shang dynasty became historical. But even as scholars looked back at the Shang, the inscriptions revealed that the Shang had been gazing into the future:

“In the next ten days there will be no disasters.”

“If\we raise 3,000 men and call upon them to attack the Gongfang, we will receive abundant aSsistance.”

“Lady Hao’s childbearing will be good.”

The bones speak of war and harvest, disease and childbirth; their subjects range from the toothaches of kings to potential harm befalling the capital. They are heavy with descriptions of sacrifices, both human and animal. Natural forces are feared and respected. Foreign tribes can be allies or enemies. Statements are brief and to the point. And yet some inscriptions ring across the centuries with haunting beauty and mystery: “In the afternoon a rainbow also came out of the north and drank in the Yellow River.”

“These were magical moments,” said David N. Keightley of the University of California at Berkeley, who is an expert on the oracle bones. He explained the process by which Shang diviners, having made a statement about the future, used the bones to verify whether or not the event would occur. The key materials were turtle plastrons or cattle scapulas, carefully cleaned and treated (both materials provide a flat surface for writing) and thinned by drill- ing notches into the back. The diviners then applied a hot object until the surface cracked— a moment that, to the Shang, represented a voice from another world.

“When it cracked, the ancestors were respond- ing to the diviner’s statement,” Keightley said. “The diviners wanted to capture this moment— “The ancestors say it with a crack in the bone, and we'll say it with the logographs.’”

The interpretation (Continued on page 70)

BRONZE AGE CHINA 65

A CENTURY OF DISCOVERY

1899-1920

Oracle bones changed everything, and quite by acci- dent. In 1899, legend has it, a Chinese man suffering from malaria acquired a turtle shell, which, when pulverized, made a traditional remedy. But before the shell was ground up, someone noticed it was engraved with inscriptions—more than 3,000 years old. Oracle bones pro- vided the first writ- ten evidence that the Shang culture really had existed, and offered intimate details of the royal court. A Shang king's diviner used an ox’s shoulder bone ora turtle’s ventral shell (right) to make pre- dictions about births, battles, harvests, or other royal concerns. The back of a bone or shell was thinned with notches (seen here on the shell). Then the diviner applied heat to crack it, and the king inter- preted the cryptic fissures like a palm reader. The predic- tion and answer were engraved. In the early 1900s scholars began to collect oracle bones by the thousands, and catalogs of the inscriptions were soon published.

ANYANG ARCHAEOLOGICAL WORK STATION, INSTITUTE OF ARCHAEOLOGY

DYNASTIES AND REPUBLICS

1000

3000 Be 2500 2000 1500

NEOLITHIC Cull TURES Yangshao cirea 5000-3000 #.c Xia (?) Shang Hongshan ca 4500-3000 8. ca 2000 B.C ca 1600 Liangzhu ca 3300-2200 #¢

1920S-19305

After completing his Ph.D. in anthro- pology at Harvard University in 1923, Li Ji (below) came home to spearhead a revolution in Chi- nese archaeology. Between 1928 and 1937 he played a leading role in the excavation of Shang

sites at Anyang, introduced rigorous scientific standards for the excavation and classification of artifacts, and helped promote coopera- tion with scientists from other coun- tries. Meanwhile, 30 miles southwest of Beijing, archaeolo- gists were finding the fossils of Peking man. Discovered in the 1920s, Homo erectus pekinensis walked upright, may have used fire, and, at more than 400,000 years old, is one

of mankind's early ancestors,

INSTITUTE OF HISTORY AND PHILOLOGY, ACADEMIA SINICA, TAIWAN,

1940S-1950S

1960s-1970s

Chinese excavations came to a standstill during Japan's occu- pation of China dur- ing World War Il,

but flourished after the founding of the People's Republic in 1949, China‘s new communist leaders, who considered archaeology of national importance, established the Insti- tute of Archaeology in 1950, subsidized the publication of monographs, and expanded training at the nation’s univer- sities. Their goal was to develop a chronology of events that validated the WiEledria-ls)elcel-[ea)

to social evolution. Neolithic people such as the Yang- shao, who fashioned unusual ping water flasks (below),

were seen as virtu- ous peasant crafts- men in history's prequel to Mao's communism.

GANSU PROVINCIAL MUSEUM, LANZHOU; HEIGHT 12.5 INCHES

Persecution of “subversive” intel- lectuals, including archaeologists, marked Mao's Cul- tural Revolution (1966-1976). But in 1974 excavations began of the terra- cotta army buried with China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di of the Qin dynasty. In 1976 the tomb of Lady Hao, a consort to Shang king Wu Ding, was unearthed. It held more than 1,900 artifacts, mostly jade, bone, and bronze, including a wine vessel called a gong (below).

SHANGHAI MUSEUM, LENGTH 14.4 INCHES

1980s-1990s

The treasures of Sanxingdui, includ- ing a human figure (below) that stands eight-and-a-half feet tall from base to head, helped shift the center of gravity in Chinese archae- ology beyond the Yellow River. Knowl- edge of the neolithic increased as well: Excavations in the northeast revealed numerous finds of ritual jades and the massive stone archi- tecture of the Hong- shan culture. Near Shanghai, discov- eries indicate the Liangzhu culture had also mastered the jade arts.

SANXINGDU! MUSEUM.

goo ipelelel i500 A.D. 2000 PERIOD OF Tang Song Yuan DISUNION 618 960 1279 Republic of China . . . | . . . | . . B . . . . 1912-Present (Taiwan)

prasies ena Hens l i r [I The Three Five People’s Republic <ingdoms Sui Dynasties Ming Qing of China .D 220 681 907 1368 1644 1949-Present

NGM ART

China changed its antiquities law in 1991, allowing for- eign scientists not only to observe but also to participate in excavations. Greater exchange of data has aided compara- tive study of ancient world cultures. In 1995 the national government funded @ project to establish firm dates for the three earliest dynas- ties: Xia (still consid- ered mythical by some scholars), Shang, and Zhou. Regional archaeol- ogy is expanding, yet faces threats from development and looting.

In a final drunken daze the Shang disappeared from history with more bang than whimper

The 29th and final king, Di Xin, offering a refill at far right, indulged his appetites with abandon, hostin

orgiastic parties where revelers cavorted in a palace pool filled with wine. Those who displeased the king

were dragged away, background, to be executed. But are these tales true? They come from the subsequen

hou and Han dynasties, whose scholars portrayed the Shang’s demise as the inevitable price of vice.

A Zhou axiom—the Ma te of Heaven—declares that corrupt rul always deposed, replaced by

a new king, noble and w Long befo cientific excavations, the area around the last Shang capital,

ar modern Anyang, was called Yin ruins of Yin,” another name given the Shang

of the cracks, a task handled by the king himself, was often carved into the object, along with the original divination statement. Some- times the court engravers later recorded whether the prediction held true. One memorable epi- logue reads: “After 31 days ... [Lady Hao] gave birth; it was not good; it was a girl.”

The oracle bones refer to persons who appear in traditional historical texts, proving that the ancient tales were more than myth. Wu Ding, the 21st Shang king, is mentioned frequently by the oracle bones, as is his consort, Lady Hao (his- torians now believe that Wu Ding died around 1189 B.c.). The inscriptions continue down the dynastic line to Di Xin, the 29th and final Shang king, who was defeated by a neighboring cul- ture whose leaders subsequently became known to historians as the Zhou dynasty (circa 1045 to 256 B.c.). All told, the oracle bones discovered at Xiaotun track more than 150 years at the end of the Shang era, from before 1200 B.c. to 1045 B.c.

Before the 20th century, historians had been unaware of both the elaborate Shang divination system and the ancient culture’s sacrificial ritu- als, The 1928-1937 Xiaotun excavations uncoy- ered thousands of graves, including nine massive tombs thought to be those of the final Shang kings. All of the big tombs had been looted

7O NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

centuries ago, but they still provided evidence of bloody sacrifices. One tomb complex con- tained 74 beheaded or otherwise mutilated skele- tons. Thirty-seven horses were found in one

grave. Other burials included cattle, dogs, mon- keys, and birds.

The Shang spirits—ancestors as well as dei- ties of the natural world—demanded blood on a regular basis. One scholar has calculated that the Shang sacrificed more than 13,000 humans in the last 250 years of their rule.

In the decades since the Xiaotun excavations, the Shang has often been described as a cruel dynasty that depended on slavery for its sac- rifices. Yet none of the excavated oracle bones refer to the purchase of people, and slavery may be an anachronistic description. “You can’t use our current standards to evaluate an ancient society,” Jing explained to me.

THE VIEW OF THE SHANG. HAS ALWAYS BEE

MANIPULATED BY HISTORIANS. scholars during the Han dynasty portrayed the last Shang kings as corrupt rulers who were replaced by the

virtuous Zhou, who provided a model for the Han. Under the communist government, archaeologists emphasized Shang “slavery” because it was an essential developmental stage of the Marxist social progression that led, like some Darwinian beast rising from the muck, to feudalism, capitalism, and finally the pinnacle of communism.

This sort of political agenda often bleeds into archaeology. In the West, European archaeology first flourished during the 19th century, inspired largely by the ascendant middle classes. In part, the bourgeoisie became interested in tracing the development of ancient societies—stone to bronze to iron—because this path implicitly jus- tified their own faith in material progress.

In early 20th-century China, there was an even more critical link between the Shang and the present, because the relics appeared just as the modern nation came under attack. In 1937, as the Japanese invasion of China pressed inland, the Academia Sinica was forced to abandon its Xiaotun site. Objects like the oracle bones sym- bolized China’s survival. For the next decade, archaeologists became nomads, transporting their relics across a chain of southwestern Chi- nese cities that hadn’t yet been occupied. Just before the communist revolution gained con- trol of China in 1949, the Academia Sinica fled one final time, to Taiwan. It transported more than 1,300 crates—including the bulk of Chi- na’s archaeological treasures.

From that point on, the Chinese study of the Shang was divided between the mainland and Taiwan. Until the 1980s there was no direct con- tact between scholars on the two sides of the Tai- wan Strait. On the peripheries, foreign academics were keenly aware that theirs was an imperfect science. Keightley describes his work as “divin- ing the Shang”—a process that, in his eyes, isn’t entirely different from what was going on in the court of Wu Ding. “Just as the Shang were divining the will of their ancestors through this rather arcane process,” he explained with a smile, “we're doing the same thing. We’re engaged in a kind of academic divination.”

On the Chinese mainland the search for the Shang all but ended in 1966 with the Cul- tural Revolution. Archaeological publishing was banned, and the Anyang Archaeological Work Station, which had been reestablished in 1958 by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was

shut down. Archaeologists were attacked as proponents of “feudal” days; Chen Mengjia, one of the century’s most brilliant oracle bone schol- ars, hanged himself in a Beijing courtyard. In 1975 archaeologists at the reopened Anyang sta- tion received a political command to help the local peasants “study Dazhai.”

For years nationwide propaganda campaigns had praised Dazhai, a village in Shanxi Province, as a model agricultural commune. One of the supposed Dazhai achievements involved flat- tening hilly terrain in order to improve farming.

“We didn’t want to do it,” remembered Zheng Zhenxiang, an archaeologist at Anyang. “We didn’t want the ancient sites to get plowed over, so we did test excavations first. Under one hill we happened to find a huge underground tomb.”

The site turned out to be Lady Hao’s tomb, the first major unlooted Shang grave to be dis- covered by archaeologists. Finally, scholars had beaten the more than 3,000 years of Anyang tomb raiding—but now they were hamstrung by the limited resources of a country torn by political turmoil.

“We should have used pumps and wells to drain the site,” Zheng explained, shaking her head. “But we couldn’t afford it.”

During the 1976 excavation, the 25-foot-deep pit filled with water and mud, preventing archaeologists from getting a clear picture of the tomb arrangement. It deteriorated into a salvage project—local peasants dove into the freezing muck and dragged out relics. “They drank shots of grain alcohol beforehand, because it was so cold,” Zheng said.

The excavation uncovered 195 bronze vessels, of which over a hundred were marked with Lady Hao’s name. There were also 271 weapons, tools, and small bronzes, as well as 755 jade objects— the most jades ever found in a Shang tomb. The pit contained 16 human skeletons, along with six dogs. Lady Hao’s bronze collection weighed over 3,500 pounds.

After the excavation, a political meeting was held to criticize Lady Hao for accumulating so much wealth at the expense of the proletariat. Later in 1976, Mao Zedong died, his body put to rest in an enormous mausoleum on Tianan- men Square. The Cultural Revolution ended, and Chinese archaeologists began to dream of stability. But the future held developments that even the best bones —_ (Continued on page 79)

BRONZE AGE CHINA 71

Bewitched by bronze: A marble monster—part tiger, part human (right) —bares its teeth, but Shang bronzes are the real jaw-droppers.

A yu basin (left) may have been used to boil water, with steam escaping from a floral stem encircled by four dragon heads. A majestic Shang lei (below), which once held wine, captures what archaeologist K. C. Chang has called the Shang’s “extraordinary preoccupation” with bronzes. By about 1200 B.c, Chinese artisans knew how to cast large pieces, technology not achieved in the Mediterranean for another thousand years.

VU MARINE /OPANEE TM Ta INCHES AARILE TIGURE MIRIGHT 1.8 INCHES! STITUTE OF HISTORY AND OHILOLOGY ACADEMIA SINICA. LELVESSEL IMPIGHT 20 1 INEMES!. SHANGHAI NUSELIRE

In the grip of death, an officer named Chang was granted a tomb filled with dagger-axes, battle-axes, and spears (bottom right); the bones of 15 people and 15 dogs; plenty of jade; and a mysterious bronze hand (above), Tales from Shang crypts in Anyang suggest that soldiers enjoyed high status in a highly militarized society, though kings still had the final word. “I pray you, assist me,” the first Shang king, Tang, told his subjects prior to a battle. “If you do not obey... 1 will put your children to death with you.” Perhaps modeled on a mythical monster,

a patterning called taotie—dramatic swirls and glaring eyes—adorns

a turquoise-inlay amulet (below) and many other Shang creations.

HAPED (LENGTHY 5 INCHES AND SPEAR (LENGTH 10.75 RICHES), ANVANG ARCHAEOLOGICAL WORK STATION, INSTITUTE OF ARCHAEOLOGY. TAOTIEMEIGHT 3.2 INCHES! INSTITUTE OF HISTORY AND PHILOLOGY, ACADEMIA SINICA

urrender them. Or maybe an invading horde sacked the ‘inding these distinct treasures ir

rovince, so far south of the Shang, buried the old story of China’s origins. In nearby Jinsha, similar arti

ame to light in 2001. ‘What is certain at the moment yrites Robert Bagley of Prin

only that early Bronze Age China was a more complicated place than we used to suppose.”’

Totem toa god or king, a gilded bronze head was among more than so such treasures found at Sanxingdui. “Totally unprece- dented,” says Robert Murowchick of Boston University. “If these had not been found by archaeologists, if they just popped up at auction, you'd sus-

pect they were fakes.’

(Continued from page 71) couldn't have divined: within a decade there would be a rev- olutionary change in the perception of the Shang-era world.

The most distinctive relics of Shang culture, along with the oracle bones, are bronze vessels. Ancient China’s Bronze Age started later than in some other parts of the world—roughly 2000 B.c. in China, compared with around 3000 B.c. in southeastern Europe and the Near East. But craftsmen on the Yellow River plain quickly made up for lost time: By adding lead to the mixture of copper and tin, and developing a sophisticated casting process, they were able to produce bigger objects. “In terms of large cast- ing, the Chinese were doing things 3,000 years ago that Europeans couldn't do until a thousand years later,” said George “Rip” Rapp, a Univer- sity of Minnesota at Duluth geoarchaeologist who has helped direct the Huanbei project.

The largest Anyang vessel ever discovered weighs over 1,900 pounds. But size wasn’t the critical characteristic for the Shang, whose artistic style set the tone for centuries of Chi- nese art. Most Shang vessels are decorated with a patterning known as taotie, which looks like a stylized animal face. The taotie’s meaning has long been debated, with the only consensus being that it carries a remarkable artistic power. There are no casual glances at a Shang bronze: The taotie dominates your gaze, drawing your attention to the swirling lines that compose the “eye”—and that mutual stare, fixed across the centuries, ends when one of you finally blinks.

Bronzes with taotie patterns have been found across much of eastern China, one reason why Shang culture has been perceived in terms of a dynasty—a political entity that, like the Qin, Han, and subsequent reigns, controlled massive territories. Throughout most of the 20th cen- tury, Chinese archaeologists applied a diffusion model to their vision of the Bronze Age: Civ- ilization started along the Yellow River and then spread outward.

But by the 1980s the diffusion model was being challenged. Archaeologists working in the Yangtze River Valley provinces of Jiangxi and Hunan, more than 500 miles south of Anyang, uncovered massive bronzes that reflect a strik- ing artistic independence. Local specialists argued that these were advanced independent cultures, and many questioned whether the

Shang had been a dynasty in the traditional sense. ““Shang dynasty’ is a very ambiguous term,” Zhichun Jing told me. Searching for an analogy, Jing pointed out that every time he sees a McDonald’s sign, he isn’t necessarily in the United States. “A lot of people confuse the cultural elements with the political elements,” he continued. “I would say that in terms of a political entity, the Shang was actually very small—no bigger than three river valleys. But the cultural influence was much bigger.”

The idea that significant, non-Shang cultures had existed outside the Yellow River plain was slow to catch on. After decades of Anyang exca- vations, there were far more Shang relics than those of any other culture. Politics contributed to the imbalance, because government officials had a vested interest in a unified China, both past and present. And the sheer power of the Chinese script played a role, because the oracle bones are closely linked to today’s writing. “The oracle bones of course see everything from the Anyang king’s point of view,” said Robert Bagley, a Bronze Age specialist at Princeton University who believes that the study of non-Shang cultures has been neglected. “It’s like that New Yorker map where most of the world consists of Manhattan.”

IN_1986A PEASANT WoO NAMED

XU WENQIU HELPED CHANGE THE

MAP OF ANCIENT CHINA. A resident of Sanxingdui, a

small village in Sichuan Province, Xu and her neighbors were digging clay to make bricks when a cache of carved jade pieces suddenly appeared. “The next thing I saw was everybody running away,” the 50-year-old remembered with a laugh, when I visited her simple home. “They all dis- appeared, and so did the jade.”

Archaeologists quickly took over (and military police were called in to make sure the jade reap- peared). That summer a remarkable new culture came to light. Two pits contained hundreds of artifacts: elephant tusks, cowrie shells, and objects of jade, gold, and bronze. The pits, which had been buried around 1200 B.c., were roughly contemporary to Wu Ding and Lady Hao.

But Sanxingdui and Anyang are nearly 700

BRONZE AGE CHINA 79

miles apart, and many Sanxingdui bronzes are unlike anything else ever discovered in China. There’s a unique emphasis on the human form— the pits included more than 50 heads, 20 masks, and one enormous eight-and-a-half-foot-tall stat- ue of a man. The heads are narrow and elongat- ed, dominated by enormous eyes. Like those of the taotie, the Sanxingdui eyes have a mesmer- izing power, but a viewer instantly recognizes that he is staring into the gaze of a very different beast.

“Even the diehards who believed in the dif- fusion model have given up in the face of San- xingdui,” said Bagley. “Nobody is claiming that this stuff comes from Anyang.”

In 2001, at a construction site in Jinsha, another city in Sichuan, workers stumbled upon a pit containing similar bronzes. But no written language has been discovered, and scholars have not found a Shang oracle bone that refers to the Sanxingdui culture. From an archaeological point of view, the pits of Sanxingdui and Jinsha remain completely isolated—in Sichuan, the next discovery of comparable wealth dates to more than a thousand years after Sanxingdui.

But the relics hint at links across ancient China. Some of the Sanxingdui jade pieces can be traced to cultures near Anyang, while a few bronze vessels are clearly imports from the

80 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

middle Yangtze region, or may be imitations of that area’s style. Increasingly, archaeologists view early Bronze Age China in terms of multiple centers of civilization that exchanged goods and technologies.

This model suits the political climate of post- reform China, where trade is king and region- alism often turns neighbors into rivals. In Beijing I met a lapsed archaeologist named Xu Chao- long, a Sichuan native and Sanxingdui specialist. A decade ago Xu was one of the most promising young Chinese archaeologists, but since 1998 he has worked for Kyocera Corporation, a Japanese company that produces cell phones. He told me that he had abandoned academics in part because he was frustrated by the overemphasis on Yellow River plain archaeology. In his opin- ion, Sanxingdui and other southern sites deserve greater attention. To prove his point, he empha- sized that Sun Yat-sen, Mao Zedong, and Deng Xiaoping all hailed from the south.

“Today is a period of great change in China, both economically and politically,” Xu said. “Where does this change come from? The south. Why should the south lead our economy? Because it was also this way in the past. The Yangtze wasn’t some barbarian region. It was even more advanced than the Yellow River.”

TIME IN CHINA— THAT EXTRA DIMENSION—TENDS TO BLUR. The past and the present

are never completely separate; a single conver- sation can span so many disparate personali- ties—Lady Hao and Wu Ding; Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping—that they seem to be rubbing elbows. As a result, the profession of archaeol- ogy was a risky one in the 20th century. Three major oracle bone scholars committed suicide. Some archaeologists died in the mid-century wars; others were imprisoned.

Shih Chang-ju has outlived it all, At 100 years of age, he is the last of the original Xiaotun excavators. In 1936 he helped uncover the larg- est oracle bone pit ever found; the following year, along with the rest of the Academia Sinica, he fled from the Japanese. In 1949 he went to Tai- wan, leaving behind a wife and the work fields of Anyang. He never saw either of them again.

“I was finally invited back about ten years ago,” he told me. “But by then I was too old to travel.”

He spoke with a strong Henan accent, and he had trouble walking. Shih himself was becoming a subject for archaeology: the Academia Sinica preserves his old Keuffel & Esser surveying scope in a glass case. But Shih still comes to work every day, and his memory is perfect—his nickname is “the living dictionary.” When I visited, a note- book from 1936 was lying open on his desk. For half a century he has meticulously studied the relics and records of the old Xiaotun excavations.

His eyes lit up when I asked if he had heard about the most recent discovery.

“Huanbei City,” he said instantly. “We con- ducted surveys there but never found the city. There was already so much for us to do at Xiao- tun. They have time to research it now.”

Back at Huanbei Shang City, nothing had changed in the year since my first visit. The airfield, the corn, the tiny holes—all the same, Zhichun Jing and his colleagues were using Luoyang spades to follow an underground wall.

But Tang Jigen, the 37-year-old director of the Anyang research station, was excited. He told me that early signs indicated that Huanbei might have been a Shang capital that predated the site at Xiaotun. For archaeologists, Huanbei is also significant because it was discovered during a systematic survey. Chinese archaeologists speak

of “active” and “passive” excavations—the latter are discoveries that come about by chance, whether through making bricks, flattening hills, or digging a building’s foundation.

“If we could, we'd concentrate on active exca- vations all over China,” Tang said. “Then we could do it systematically, but often because of economic reasons it just isn’t possible. That’s starting to change, though.”

Still, few people are naive enough to think that Chinese archaeology will escape entirely from modern pressures like development and politics. During the 1990s the Chinese government fund- ed the Xia-~Shang-Zhou Chronology Project, whose stated goal—establishing firm dates for these three dynasties in China’s “continuous civilization’—seems at odds with the nuanced portrait of ancient China that has emerged in recent years. A number of scholars criticize the project as more nationalistic than academic.

Early scattered excavations at Huanbei were funded by the Xia-Shang-Zhou project, but the survey work has depended on foreign fund- ing and has involved foreign specialists—coop- eration that would have been impossible only a decade earlier. Once mapping is complete, excavations will follow.

I joined Jing out on the Japanese airfield. A ditch cut into the field’s border had just re- vealed an enormous round stone that appeared to be a foundation for a Shang building. Above the stone, the earth showed traces of a wood- en pillar that had rotted away centuries ago. “We've never seen anything like this before,” Jing said.

He turned to an old peasant he’d known for years and asked if he knew of similar stones. “A lot of time villagers give good information,” he told me. Later that fall Jing’s words would prove accurate. Heeding local advice, the survey turned up a stone that was part of the largest Shang building foundation ever discovered.

Once again the flow of time in Anyang had scattered its unlikely driftwood: A Japanese airfield, a young U.S.- trained Chinese archae- ologist, an old peas- ant with a feel for the earth, But finally the

Curious about how Chinese names are pronounced? Why Peking became Beijing?

pieces made sense— | Check out Did You Know?— a lost city coming to | and more—at nationalgeo light. O graphic.com/ngm/0307.

BRONZE AGE CHINA 81

By T. R. Reid Photographs by Joel Sartore

66 ff your bums, you pillocks,”

the one-armed man said. “We've got two more moun- tains to climb.” Partly out of curios- ity, but mainly because I was much

more inclined just then to

sit on my bum than to pull my battered body up another mountain, | stalled for time with a question: “What’s a pillock?”

“You don’t know the word ‘pillock?’” laughed Pete Crow, the comedian on our team of climbers. “Don’t you Yanks speak English?”

“A pillock is a bloke who’s always faffing around,” piped up Phil Barnes, a powerful man with legs like tree trunks stuffed into black British Army boots. When I looked mys- tified at that, Kelvin Highmore, the

PHOTOGRAPHER'S NOTES kindly father figure of our team,

: These arethe | came to my rescue. “He means, you Just so you know’ eee tos | Know,a stupid berk,” Kelvin said. “A skiver. A wally.” worst mountain-climbing photos |

By now other members of the group were throwing

out their own definitions. But my lesson in British slang

| came to an abrupt end when Tom Perkins, our one-armed

. " captain, pulled a glove onto his left hand with his teeth

team of firemen scaling three a started ee up the rocky slope of Scafell Pike,

British peaks. I'm out of shape. England’s highest mountain. We all scrambled to catch

I hate mountains. | hate hills, too, up. In a flash, the seven of us were off on the second leg of Great Britain’s notorious Three Peaks Challenge.

ever published in this magazine. 1 only had 24 hours to cover a

and I'm not that fond of stairs.

G ka, which is so At that point I did feel like a pillock, a faffer, and a adie hone doesn't genuinely stupid berk just for taking on the Three Peaks, farstace eee f one of the more grueling endeavors yet devised by the

j its for go anywhere. It just wal

fiendish minds of people who climb mountains for fun. The Challenge is a demanding test of stamina, logistics, and sheer will power, but it stems from a simple geo- graphic fact: While Britain has produced some of the world’s Our climbing team greatest mountaineers, the country has no great mountains of its own. flashes by (left to British climbers regularly train on Ben Nevis, a flinty bald peak in the right): Phil Barnes, Scottish highlands, By official measure of the national Ordnance Survey, Tom Perkins, Julian its summit is the highest point in Great Britain. But that’s like being the Parsons, Kelvin High- _ longest hole on a miniature golf course. Ben Nevis rises an underwhelming more, Martyn Olden, 4,408 feet above the silver-gray lochs of central Scotland.

Pete Crow. Writer T. R.

The trek from sea level to summit is not exactly a walk in the woods Reid leads the way. (for one thing, there are no trees on the Ben’s stony escarpment), but

the sun to take it up to the sky.

JOEL SARTORE WITH RUSSELL CHADWICK

84 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

sending a veteran mountaineer up Ben Nevis is the equivalent of asking a four-star chef to order in pizza

from Domino's. To overcome this altitudinal shortfall, serious British

climbers sometimes cram two or three different summits into a single day’s outing. The mother of all these multi- mountain climbs is a trek with pan-Britannic sweep, taking in the highest peaks in each of the three countries that make up the island of Great Britain. That’s the Three Peaks Chal- lenge: You have to climb the tallest mountains in Scotland (Ben Nevis, 4,408 feet), in England (Scafell Pike, 3,205 feet), and in Wales (Snowdon, 3,560 feet). And you have to do them

all in 24 hours.

he whole adventure involves 21 miles of hiking, 18,786 vertical feet of ascent and descent, 500 miles of driving between the peaks, and enough unprintable British slang to turn the Queen’s ears blue. Some climbers are such masochists that they actually do this in the depths of winter, but the preferred time is right around the summer solstice, when the longest days of the year provide the maximum hours of daylight climbing. Indeed, Ben Nevis is so far north—roughly the same latitude as Juneau, Alaska—that twilight in early

Even the Scottish sheep were faster than | was. It’s not like | didn’t train, | Switched from Co-

Coa Puffs to Cap’n Crunch to cut a on sugar. | ate cake dough- nuts instead of glazed to limit fat. And when | learned that the Silvie planned to race-walk up, then run down, all three Mountains, i

I reacted like the Pro lam. | cried. }

summer lingers nearly until midnight. Accordingly, most Three Peakers start by climbing Ben Nevis early one evening in mid-June, then pile into cars or vans and race south overnight to top the other two

mountains the next day.

To climb three mountains in three countries in one day, you need to be a little wacky. You need a mountain of equipment and food; our van was stocked with enough energy drinks and Power- Bars to feed a small nation for weeks. Most of all, though, you need a team. You need a team to deal with the logistics of long-distance travel from Scot- land to England to Wales. And since misery loves company in the mountains, you need a team for encouragement, to keep you going when every sinew in your body is telling you to quit.

This team business proved a problem for me when I decided to give it a go last year: All my friends were much too sane to try the Three Peaks Challenge. So I approached Ludo Macaulay, a friendly fireman from Wiltshire who organizes an annual charity assault on

the Three Peaks for the British Fire Service,

with climbing teams from fire stations all

over Great Britain. Ludo assigned me to the squad from Chippenham, an ancient market town on the Salis- bury Plain west of Stonehenge. Officially, my group was des- ignated Fire Brigade Team B-24, Unofficially, and more appropriately, it was known as Team Perkins.

eam Perkins was born—although nobody realized it at the

time—on August 4, 1998. A quiet summer’s afternoon at the

fire station was interrupted by an emergency call: A motor-

cycle had crashed into a highway maintenance truck on a coun- try road outside Chippenham, and both vehicles were ablaze. The fire brigade rescue team raced to the site, sirens blaring, but was evidently too late. “We could see that the biker was gone,” recalls fireman Keith Bacon. “He was burned everywhere. His right leg was basically snapped in two, and the only thing connecting the right arm to his body was his leather jacket.

“So we focused on putting the fires out, clearing the road. And then— this was 15 minutes later, maybe—I just happened to glance over at the guy on the bike. I thought to myself, Hold on. Dead men don’t twitch. He must be alive. So we went over and took off his helmet. That's when we realized for the first time that this poor bloke was one of our own.”

That poor bloke was Tom Perkins, a Chippenham firefighter who was then 26 years old. He lapsed into a coma after the crash and woke up a month later to find his right arm gone, his face and his remaining arm furiously blistered by fire, and his right knee so badly shattered that doc- tors warned he might never walk again.

“But gradually,” he told me when | met him four years after the accident, “I learned to compensate for that knee by using other muscles

PHOTOGRAPHER’s NOTES Every year On their Way north, the firemen stop at Bisckpoot's Pleasure Beach park to unwind, | vag to get happy before the

climb. They were really happy i ba this caterpillar tide, because i I'd called ahead to get them in o free. Then We hit the road | 'n a white van that smelled like | cheese (and Not in a good Way)

Climbing Great Britain’s three highest mountains in under 24 hours takes prepa- ration. The Chippen- ham team trained with stretches at the fire station (top left) and light lifting at the pub (left). Why not give up beer before the big race? “That might not be such a bad idea,” said Julian, “but we're English.”

THREE PEAKS CHALLENGE 87

in my leg. To strengthen them, I was up and down the steps of that hos-

pital day and night. When I finally left the hospital, I was walking. But I Thousands of climbers needed something else to keep my muscles strong.” attempt the Three Tom’s friends at the fire station gave him that something else. They Peaks Challenge each formed a Chippenham team to enter the Three Peaks Challenge in 1999, year. For safety’s sake, with Tom as team leader. “We trained together for months,” said Kelvin participants in the Highmore. “That first climb was the hardest thing I ever did. But when- firemen’s event must ever | thought it was too much, I looked up ahead at Tom, with his arm take at least 11 hours _ gone and his dodgy leg, and he was going strong. There’s no question that to drive the 500-mile Tom is our inspiration.”

route. Speeding By the time I joined Team Perkins, Tom and Kelvin had put together between peaks won't a strong, seasoned group of six climbers, drawn partly from the fire sta- help their times; early _ tion and partly from a local factory, plus two designated drivers, for the arrivals at Scafell Three Peaks Challenge. The guys were as tough as they looked—tattoos Pike and Snowdon are on their arms, gold rings in their ears, and muscles everywhere. They made to wait for the rolled their own cigarettes while chatting casually about marathons and official safe drivers’ long-distance bike rides they had finished.

start time to begin. In fact, Team Perkins had only one weak link: me.

Route of Ae

okm ART BY JAMES NOEL SANTH NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAPS

Ben Nevis’s summit is the highest point in Great Britain. But that’s like being the longest hole on a miniature golf course.

month before the climb, Tom called to say he was filling out the official entry forms; he needed to know my age. “Fifty- eight,” I replied. This was followed by a long, pregnant silence from the other end of the phone. “Well, you're a really fit 58, right?” he finally replied.

As that exchange made clear to me, there was a yawning gap between me and the six strapping athletes on my team, some of them a quarter century younger than I was. But the group welcomed me nonetheless, particularly the gruff, amiable Kelvin, who, at 42, had been the Old Man of the team until I came along. During a planning session at the fire station, I was delighted to find that several members of Team Perkins

It’s the “most beautiful

s (below), though “you don’t reciate it when you go for speed.” Their

fast pace later slowed

the team: Pete twisted an ankle and Julian strained a knee.

Neither junk food nor health food was much help to the tired firemen after their Ben Nevis descent, Julian, Pete, Martyn, and Tom (left to right) had conquered one mountain, but they had two more peaks to go. And Pete—who, according to Julian, is “a bit of a delicate traveler” —was feeling queasy.

Wiis

You need a team for encouragement, to keep you going when every sinew in your body

Is telling you to quit. ‘

“Vomiting Pete” lived took the same approach to climbing that I did—that is, constant griping. up to his nickname “We're going to whinge our way to the top,” said Pete Crow, using (below) as the van another English word I didn’t know. (It means complain or whine.) “If sped toward Scafell the sun’s out, we'll whinge it’s too hot. If it’s raining, we'll whinge it’s Pike. Other calls of too wet. When we finish the thing, we'll whinge our time wasn’t good

nature (above) were enough.” Here was a climber after my own heart. answered outside. Having taken in a semi-elderly American, Team Perkins was equally welcoming when another Yank, Joel Sartore, was assigned to photograph our epic trek. A confirmed flatlander from Nebraska, Joel told us the highest point he'd ever reached was the eighth story of the

Holiday Inn in Lincoln.

The night before the climb we all gathered in Fort William, Scotland, just below Ben Nevis. We expected a lot of company the next morning. The Three Peaks Challenge has grown so popular that, despite everyone’s best intentions, the increased noise, trash, and trail erosion have become a

problem. Mindful of all the factors, Tom told us that his goal was to reach the top of the third mountain in 18 hours, 30 minutes, more than an hour faster than

hed before. Kelvin objected.

was too ambitious even for the experienced members of the team, he said, not to mention the rookie climber from

America. As all eyes turned to me, I admitted sheepishly

that my goal was to finish in 23 hours, 59 minutes, 59

seconds—and I wasn’t sure I could make that.

For a moment, I feared a nasty trans-Atlantic con- tretemps. But that tough Chippenham crew proved to be adept at international diplomacy. Over prodigious quantities of beer, we worked out a mutually satisfac- tory modus ascendi: The selfless Kelvin volunteered to form a sub-team with me. We would start up Ben Nevis a couple of hours earlier than the others, so as not to hold them back. On the following two mountains, we'd work out a similar accommodatio

Perkins had ever

PHOTOG RAPHER’S NOTES Iwas trying to get some rest on - vans floor, | wasn't succeed- 'ng. Perhaps | Was thinking about whether Iq ver get another Seelgnment from the Geocrapnic Considering that the high Point ” Coverage so far involved getting a shot of a guy throwing Up, and another of two guys Peeing iby the side of the road.

a = to ve > ta = IS =

= a3 wt tay

aad a —s ~ Swe

Everybody knows “that Snowdon—

where an old railroad

chugs tourists up to

the top—is an easy two-hour climb. Except

that it wasn’t easy-

The Three Peaks Challenge ends, officially, at the top of ut even though the clock had stopped

5 Snowdon in Wales. B “coticking, the Chippenham fir _ Sf The team finished in 1 ~~. Shettering the previous year’s a

emen ran back down “just for 9 hours and 32 minutes ttempt by one minute.

PHOTOGRAPHER'S NOTES This isn’t me, but it could be. Actually, this guy injured him-

self while running down Scafell

Pike. Entire teams run down the first two mountains during the Three Peaks Challenge. They're trying to win gold medals—as our team did—for finishing the race in less than 20 hours. In Nebraska we give out gold

medals too. For pie eating.

he next morning, the local TV weatherman

forecast a dreich day, a guttural Scottish word

that connotes dark, wet, windy, and generally

miserable. Nonetheless, the base of Ben Nevis was swarming with fire brigade teams (including an all- female squad in running shorts who told me they planned to jog the whole way) when Kelvin and I started climb- ing late in the afternoon. We crossed the footbridge over a lovely stream with a lovely name, Water of Nevis, and started uphill.

Seriously uphill. Relentlessly uphill. After the first exhausting half hour at Kelvin’s swift pace, I swore that I would never again sneer at a measly little 4,408- foot summit.

The path up Ben Nevis winds past a turquoise mountain pond (what the Scots call a lochan) and fords a roaring stream that cascades for a thousand

feet down the mountainside. In mid-June it’s lined with stands of deep purple foxglove and bright yellow gorse, and offers spectacular views of the Highlands, with tiny villages scattered amid dra- matic flint outcroppings. Not that a Three Peaker

gets to appreciate any of these natural wonders,

though—with that 24-hour clock ticking away,

you can’t stop to look, It felt like riding a race-

car through the Louvre, catching a stray glimpse

_¢ ofa masterpiece over your shoulder now and then as you rushed onward.

Roughly two and a half hours from the start, Kelvin and | pulled our way up a long, slippery patch of slushy snow. Suddenly, the steep trail flat- tened into a granite summit: the rooftop of Great Britain! Partly out of a reporter’s sense of duty, but mainly looking for an excuse to rest, I sat down on a rock to record the objects I found there, most of them totems carried up by earlier climbers: a stone from Coventry Cathedral; another from the 1953 Everest expedition; a squat stone pillar labeled “Britain’s Highest War Memorial.” I was writing busily when Kelvin interrupted me, sounding worried: “It’s 21 degrees below zero up here,” he said, which would make it about minus 6°F. “The sweat on your clothes is a sheet of ice. I’ve got to get you down.”

As we approached that turquoise lochan on our descent, we ran into the rest of Team Perkins, chugging rapidly upward toward the summit.

Suddenly I was jet-propelled, or maybe joy-propelled, driven by the knowledge that I wouldn’t have to climb any more stinking mountains.

96 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

With our head start, Kelvin and I reached the

bottom of Ben Nevis in time for a quick dinner of PowerBars and energy drinks. We were just starting to doze off when Tom and the others came clattering down the trail. Without a second’s delay, the climbers scam- pered straight into the white van and began stripping out of their soak- ing clothes to put on dry ones as we set off on the six-hour journey south to Scafell Pike.

Some Three Peakers never manage to sleep on the jerky, bumpy ride between mountains; about half our team told me later they were awake, and uncomfortable, all night long. I was far too exhausted to have that problem, One minute I was watching a late, late sunset fall on the unyielding moonscape of the Scottish Highlands, with steep gray cliffs rising abruptly from boulder-strewn valleys. A second later, it seemed, I opened my eyes to a misty dawn over the far more gentle geography of the English Lake District, where fat sheep grazed on lush meadows beneath round green hilltops.

It was 4:50 a.m., and freezing, when the van rumbled past a mountain lake called Wastwater and pulled up at the base of England’s tallest moun- tain. Within just minutes we were on our way up. Scafell is the lowest of the Three Peaks, but by consensus it is the hardest to climb, both physi- cally and psychologically. “The real problem is, it’s second,” Pete warned me. “You don’t have the energy you had at the beginning, but you don’t have the second wind that comes from knowing you're on the last one. Anyway, Scafell is a crap mountain. First it’s all scree, and straight up.

Snowdon’s windy summit was no peak experience for tod- dler Adam Crowder (above). Half a mil- lion tourists visit the mountain's top each year, many by train.

THREE PEAKS CHALLENGE 97

Then you come to this boulder field. The trail disappears, you get all these false summits, and you want to say, Enough! I’m sick of this.”

I told myself that this was just Pete in his whinging mode, but everything he said proved true. The first hour up Scafell Pike, a severe climb along the bed of a cold mountain stream called Brown Tongue, was so tough that Kelvin had to quit the climb because of a sore neck. And then Pete dropped out, too. “I’m totally knackered,” he gasped, and the utter exhaustion on his ashen face told me exactly what that British word must mean.

With my closest partners gone, I fell farther and farther behind the rest of Team Perkins. On my own, dazed with fatigue, | was wandering like a lost sheep amid giant rocks halfway up the slope. Then another team, this one from Cambridgeshire, came up from behind and adopted the lost sheep on the spot. “You can make this mountain!” said Matt Day, a cheery, energetic climber with a team of engineers. With the Cambridgeshire team to shepherd me along, I reached Scafell’s stern summit and scrambled back down in just over four hours, only 52 minutes behind my

Perkins teammates.

s we agreed in advance, Team | Perkins went ahead toward | Snowdon without wait-

ing for me. I hitched a | ride in another van for the pretty drive down the west coast | of England to the slate black mountains of north Wales.

Exactly five hours after leaving Scafell, | saw the dark pyr- amid of Snowdon towering above a trio of crystalline alpine lakes (what the Welsh call Ilynnoedd). Starting up | the trail, I felt tired but elated. It was 2 p.m. and I had more | than three hours left before the 24-hour limit ran out. And

PHOTOGRAPHERS NOTES everybody knows that Snowdon—where an old railroad We celebrated our Three Peaks | chugs tourists up to the top—is an easy two-hour climb.

ictory at a pub. Obviously Vd t Except that it wasn’t easy. With every uphill step, my victory ;

| muddy, bloody, depleted body told me that three peaks é | in 24 hours was just too much. As I hiked along the bank that day. Let's face it, people like of the highest llyn, I desperately wanted to plop my bum me aren’t meant to climb moun- | sesscatie =e and - ni Soni) ie. with a

‘ ; e | steep half mile still to go, the trail made a sharp turn to tains, and certainly not thre | the pie ts OE sno a 40-mile-an-hour ea wind that did its best to blow me all the way back downhill.

had a few too many mountains

in one day. There should be signs

saying, “No butterballs with: And yet I fairly flew up that last half mile. For now I cameras beyond this point.” I'd | could see, straight ahead, the top of Snowdon and the never changed film while run- | end of the 24-hour ordeal.

Suddenly I was jet-propelled, or maybe joy-propelled, driven by the knowledge that I wouldn’t have to climb do it again. / any more stinking mountains. I cruised happily to the summit with a smile on my face that did not fade.

ning before, and | don’t want to

98 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC + JULY 2003

I was still wearing that stupid grin hours later when Team Perkins gathered at a pub for a session listed on our schedule as “major rehydration.” Not everybody was as cheerful as I, Our captain and three other team members had completed the Three Peaks in 19 hours, 32 minutes—a fantastic achievement for most people, but less than sat isfactory for “a pretty determined person” like Tom Perkins. “It was good, but not what I was looking for,’ Tom told me, with a pint of ale in his left hand and a sheaf of papers under the stump of his right arm, “At least this gives us a goal to shoot for next year.”

The team’s American contingent, of course, had no plans whatsoever to climb again next year. Joel had his photos, and I had an official time of 22 hours, 55 minutes in the recorded annals of the Three Peaks Chal- lenge. That ranked me perilously near the bottom of the 800 fire brigade climbers who completed the ordeal in 2002. But no matter, | had come in under 24 hours. I felt as if I had won the lottery.

And maybe I had. As a member of a fire brigade team, I had to buy raf- fle tickets worth 30 British pounds—about 47 dollars—with proceeds benefiting the Fire Services National Benevolent Fund, I may even have the winning ticket—but I absolutely refuse to find out. That’s because the grand prize in the lottery was ten days of climbing the peaks of the Andes in Peru. After my own one-day climb of Britain’s Three Peaks, that’s a prize I hope I never, ever win. 0

The Challenge was

finished—and so were

the firemen, slumped in sleep as the van headed home. Their resolve to help Tom Perkins, right, recover from a near-fatal acci- dent got them started as Three Peakers. Four years and four races later, friendship keeps them going.

> WEBSITE EXCLUSIVE |

Share the best, worst, and quirkiest moments from the author and photographer in On Assignment, and find more photos at national geographic,com/ngm/0307.

THREE PEAKS CHALLENGE 99

Here’s the

Sirviving nets, = r) ~@ habitat loss, and *4 flood Of farmed fish, Atlantic salmon face an uncertain future.

As wild populations falter and salmon farms go global, this noble sport fish has turned into the chicken of the sea.

“His fishing was not a sport... but a... solemn sacrament,” wrote Henry David Thoreau

of an angler on Massachusetts‘s Concord River, which lost its salmon to dams in the 1800s.

Fishermen now travel far to stalk healthy streams such as Iceland’s Hvita River (above).

tanding on a grassy bank of the River Deveron, Lord Marnoch, an eminent Scot- tish judge, is attached—via a 12-foot fly rod, a bit of line, and a hook— to an Atlantic salmon. The creature struggling to dislodge Lord Marnoch’s fly from its jaw was spawned in the Deveron, resided several years in the river, and has spent the past year fatten- ing up in the North Atlantic, probably near the Faroe Islands or Iceland, before completing its long migration home to reproduce. It is a strong, wild, young salmon of about five pounds, known as a grilse, and it was doing fine until it entered the Deveron and succumbed to the allure of Lord Marnoch’s delicate, orange fly.

Lord Marnoch is the very picture of the clas- sic Atlantic salmon angler. A distinguished- looking man of 62 with a thick head of graying hair, he is dressed on this cool July day in moss green knickers, a beige cashmere sweater, and a brown tie. Over his knickers he is wearing pale green waders. He carries a wooden walking stick and wears a tweed, olive-colored deerstalker cap. He was born Michael Bruce, but upon being elevated to Scotland’s High Court he was given the title of Lord Marnoch, an honor he wears with ease. He and several friends have come to the Deveron in northeastern Scotland to catch the king of game fish, a highly civilized pursuit that involves much angling but also pleasant hours eating paté sandwiches and drinking single-malt whisky in a green hut by the Deveron. It is a picturesque river, about 25 yards wide in this stretch, and flows placidly through a hilly landscape that is a checkerboard of green wheat fields, slopes of golden barley, and tidy forests of larch, beech, and alder.

The fish is holding firm in the depths of a

“The Atlantic salmon is a power-packed, leaping, silver thing of beauty.” ee |

104 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC +

JULY 2003

BY FEN MONTAIGNE PHOTOGRAPHS BY PAUL NICKLEN

tea-colored pool, its resistance causing Lord Marnoch’s rod to bend and his line to shudder. Shadowing the judge is his gillie, or fishing guide, Harvey Grant, a man who comes to the river dressed in a windowpane tweed suit and who, in his Scottish brogue, gently dispenses words of advice: “Walk it upstream, sir, just like you're walking a dog.”

Soon, Lord Marnoch has reeled the silver crea- ture into the bank, where Grant nets it.

“Not a bad wee grilse,” says Lord Marnoch.

“Kill it, sir?” asks Grant.

“Absolutely,” replies Lord Marnoch, where- upon the gillie grabs a rock and ends the salm- on’s migration with a firm tap to the head.

“ really think these beautiful creatures are far too fine to be played with and put back,” says Lord Marnoch, a salmon conservationist who nonetheless believes in killing a few for the pot. “Catch-and-release fishing is rather like in the Roman arena going thumbs up or down. If a beautiful creature has succumbed to me, I think the right thing is to hit it on the head.”

The scene is a timeless one, and the grilse caught by Lord Marnoch fits the image of an Atlantic salmon: Salmo salar, the “leaper” in Latin, a sleek, chrome-colored fish that fights its way up northern rivers, jumping rapids and waterfalls on its spawning run. The truth is, how- ever, that wild Atlantic salmon have been in steep decline for decades, and today the North Atlan- tic is dominated by a new kind of salmon. It can be found not far from Lord Marnoch’s fishing hole on the Deveron, packed into sea cages in the lochs of western Scotland. There, about 50 million farmed Atlantic salmon swim round and round in pens as they are fed pellets to speed their growth, pigments to mimic the pink hue of wild salmon flesh, and pesticides to kill the lice that go hand-in-hand with an industrial feedlot. It is these salmon that you purchase at the market for five dollars a pound, and today in Scotland—as in many North Atlantic coun- tries—farmed salmon outnumber wild salmon by 300 or 400 to one. Indeed, in Norway, whose long coastline harbors the world’s largest pop- ulation of wild Atlantic salmon, a single fish farm

“When these fish take your fly, your heart misses three beats,” says Cascapédia River manager Marc Gauthier. Here he releases a huge male used in a spawning-enhancement program. Even on Canada’s best streams, less than 8 percent of smolts survive to spawn.

produces as many salmon a year as the esti mated 600,000 wild salmon that migrate up the country’s 650 salmon rivers to spawn.

Now there is growing evidence that pen-raised Atlantic salmon are threatening their wild breth- ren, If so, aquaculture would be the latest in a long line of insults that have whittled down the once great numbers of wild salmon, whose pres- ence has lent magic to rivers on both sides of the North Atlantic.

No one knows for sure, but scientists esti- mate that before the industrial age at least ten million salmon returned annually from the sea to an arc of rivers that ran from the Hudson in New York, up through New England and east- ern Canada, across to Iceland and the British Isles, over to Scandinavia and the Baltic, up to northern Russia, and down the Atlantic coast

of Europe to Portugal. Salmon once migrated

in immense numbers up such renowned rivers as the Connecticut, Thames, Rhine, and Loire.

Then came the industrial revolution, and with it the dams and pollution that, by the mid-20th century, had rendered rivers like the Thames and Rhine uninhabitable to salmon. From the mid- 1960s to the early 1980s an equally strong blow came as the international fishing fleet discov- ered a major salmon feeding ground off Green- land, setting off a netting frenzy that led to several million wild salmon being killed annually in the North Atlantic. Governments and con- servation groups, working with the North Atlantic Salmon Conservation Organization, struck back by launching an ongoing effort to buy out and regulate salmon fishermen, a suc- cessful campaign that has drastically reduced commercial salmon fishing in the Atlantic.

By the late 1990s, with most commercial nets retired, conservationists were eagerly awaiting a rebound in salmon numbers. So far they’ve been disappointed. Wild Atlantic salmon pop ulations now hover around 3.5 million—half what they were 30 years ago and a fraction of the estimated 500 million wild Pacific salmon.

ATLANTIC SALMON 105

The World Wildlife Fund recently reported that Atlantic salmon are endangered or threatened in close to 60 percent of their range. In the Unit- ed States—whose rivers were once home to a population of roughly half a million Atlantic salmon—the number of wild Salmo salar has collapsed to a few hundred. The list of suspects in the continuing decline is long, including deg- radation of rivers, acid rain, shrinking ocean habitat (possibly related to global warming), netting of juvenile salmon by herring and mack- erel trawlers, and aquaculture.

“It’s death by a thousand cuts,” says Freder- ick G. Whoriskey, Jr., vice president for research at the Atlantic Salmon Federation, a leading salmon conservation organization.

The cut that most concerns many conserva- tionists today is fish farming. From its cottage- industry beginnings in Norway in the late 1960s, Atlantic salmon farming has exploded into a two-billion-dollar-a-year business that produces 2.6 billion pounds of fish.

Now largely controlled by a handful of mul- tinational corporations, the Atlantic salmon aquaculture industry has even spread to the Pacific, with Chile rivaling Norway as the world’s leading producer of farmed salmon. The indus- try has brought what was once an expensive sea- sonal delicacy into the reach of the common

106 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

FEEDLOTS OF THE SEA Atlantic salmon farms are flourishing in the Pacific, with Chile and British Columbia now major producers. Farms like this one off Vancouver Island bring jobs but also pollution, diseases, and escaped fish that threaten to displace native salmon.

man. Today farmed salmon is truly the chicken of the sea.

Salmon aquaculture has created undeniable benefits, which include taking commercial fishing pressure off wild salmon stocks and pro- viding employment to depressed maritime areas. But the mass production of this magnificent migratory creature has come at a cost. Hundreds of millions of salmon in cages have fouled the sea around their pens, spread diseases and sea lice to wild salmon, and led to large numbers of escaped fish. Runaway domesticated salmon have begun interbreeding with wild salmon, a devel- opment that could lead to a new hybrid that is far less capable of making the heroic spawning and feeding journeys that are the hallmark of the Atlantic salmon.

“Aquaculture is the single most serious threat to the survival of Atlantic salmon,” says Donal C. O’Brien, Jr., chairman of the Atlantic Salmon Federation. “Unless (Continued on page 112)

DISTRIBUTION Of the world’s roughly 300 million adult

Atlantic salmon, only 3.5 million are wild.

Concord R.

Cobscook

y

Narraguagus R. Penobscot R.

. Jean R.

Cascapédia R.

Restigouche R. - Miramichi R. y*

PRINCE EDWARD pgISLAND

A Shrinking World

Atlantic salmon once ascended virtually every river flowing into the northern Atlantic, from

Atlantic Salmon (Salmo salar) Aquaculture region HB Native spawning range

since the industrial revolution, when dams and pollution began destroying spawning

North New York's Hudson to Por habitat in natal streams. Atlantic tugal’s Douro. They were so Despite intensive efforts over Ocean abundant in colonial times that the past 30 years to restore apprentices along the Connecti- salmon rivers on both sides of North America cut River begged their masters the Atlantic, wild salmon num- Nearly all wild salmon in the to serve them salmon no more bers continue to fall. At the western Atlantic now spawn than twice a week. But the same time, salmon farming has in Canadian rivers. The U.S. world of the Atlantic salmon blossomed into a two-billion- population—formerly a half has been shrinking steadily dollar-a-year business. million fish—has shrunk to a few hundred spawners in the rivers of Maine. U.S. popula- tions were declared endan- Europe Hvita R. Big Laxé R. gered in 2000. Europe's salmon struggle with poor water quality, aquaculture impacts, dams, and Irish nets that kill more ICELAND

than 200,000 fish each year. In Norway, where salmon Atlantic Salmon farming began, up to 90 MB Historic migration percent of the fish found in range some rivers escaped from

Aquaculture fish farms. region

Sognefjorden— North

Tt Faroe

Atlantic jy paca sle o

Ocean ‘Lewis Islandigf

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Atlantic Ocean

Yr X Scale varies in

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A diver descends into a vortex of 50,000 farmed salmon in a British Columbia sea pen to inspect its net. Roughly two years old, these fish are twice the size of wild salmon of the

same age—but half as wary. Sea lions often chomp them through the nets.

A GROWTH INDUSTRY

Norway first developed Atlantic salmon farms in the late 1960s. The industry, still dominated by Norwe- gian firms, quickly spread to the U.K. and Canada

in the 1970s, the United States in the 1980s, and Chile in the 1990s. Today uniform slabs of farmed Atlantic salmon, available year-round, have virtually replaced wild Atlantic salmon on fish counters

in North America and Europe. Dwindling runs, rock-bottom prices, and international efforts to buy out and regulate commer- cial salmon fishermen reduced the reported catch of wild fish to less than 3,000 metric tons in 2000. Only England and Ireland still allow significant com- mercial catches, and efforts are under way to retire those nets as well. Mean- while, salmon farms continue to expand.

FARMED SALMON PRODUCTION IN THE NORTH ATLANTIC (in metric tons)

WILD SALMON CATCH (in metric tons)

1980

GRAPHICS BY TIMOTHY ALT; ART BY JOHN DAWSON.

SOURCE. HISTORICAL CATCH RECORD FOR 1960-2000.

658,962

NORTH ATLANTIC SALMON CONSERVATION ORGANIZATION

me FISH FARMING

Conservationists initially heralded salmon farms as a way to relieve fishing pressure on wild popula- tions—until the farms be- gan threatening wild fish. The tightly packed pens prove an ideal breeding ground for sea lice (above, trailing egg strings), natu- rally occurring parasites that have devastated some salmon and sea trout popu- lations in Europe. Wild smolts can pick up lice as

FEEDING FRENZY

Packed with healthful

omega-3 fatty acids, salmon

is the darling of diet gurus. Yet crit- ics say it takes four pounds of fish rendered into food pellets to pro- duce a pound of farmed salmon. Industry experts counter that it takes less feed to produce a pound of salmon than a pound of poultry or pork. Pesticides and antibiotics are fed to the fish as needed.

ROAR A. LUND.

PANACEA OR PANDORA’S BOX?

they swim past infested pens. Fish farms have also spread deadly diseases to wild salmon through es- caped fish. Such problems have declined as farming techniques have improved, but escaped fish (some half a million a year in Norway alone) remain a serious threat. They com- pete and breed with wild salmon. The resulting hybrids may lack the skills necessary to survive.

A farm with a million salmon uses

up to 55,000 pounds of fish food a day.

; \

wn, F

s

FOOD COLORING

It takes about 18 months for three-ounce smolts (above, being piped into a sea pen) to reach 12 pounds. That's a good size for Greg Buttle (right), chief smoker at Quebec's Ristigouche Salmon Club, who now prepares farmed fish instead of wild. Natural pigments in shrimp and other prey of wild salmon create its trademark pink hue. Coloring agents add- ed to feed pellets enable growers to do the same.

(Continued from page 106) it is brought under control, it will one day bring about the extinc- tion of the species.”

O'Brien’s prognosis is debatable, but what is inarguable is the striking contrast between a wild

Atlantic salmon and a farmed one. Instead of

roaming freely across the Atlantic as they com- plete the mysterious, obsessive quest to get back to their home rivers, caged salmon swim cease- lessly in circles, their fins worn from rubbing into other fish and nylon nets. The only outlet for their strength is to skitter on their tails in short bursts across densely packed pens.

“You have 800,000 of these creatures crammed into cages in one spot, fed chemicals, and defecating in a shallow estuary,” says Patrick O'Flaherty, general manager of Ballynahinch Castle, a famed fishing hotel in Connemara, Ireland, that saw its wild salmon and sea trout stocks collapse as sea lice infestations spread from nearby fish farms. “Do we need this? Is it sustainable? When you take one of the most noble creatures on the planet, a creature that makes these epic voyages, and bend it to the will of man, it is a recipe for disaster. It goes against everything that is natural.”

112 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

f your desire is to see Atlantic salmon in

something close to their primordial state,

there are few better places than Iceland, the

strikingly beautiful accretion of volcanic rock, glaciers, and fertile pastureland in the heart of the salmon’s range. Anglers who ardently pursue Atlantic salmon, often paying $1,000 to $2,000 a day for the privilege, say they are drawn as much by the splendid neighborhoods the salmon inhabit as they are by catching these large, powerful fish. Iceland is typical Atlantic salmon country: remote, unspoiled, blessed with clear, cold rivers, and painted during the summer fishing season with the two-hour sunsets of the northern latitudes.

Orri Vigftisson has probably done more than any other individual to reduce the commer- cial netting that was decimating wild Atlantic salmon. His dedication to the fish arose out of his passion for catching them in his country’s rivers. One of his favorites is the Big Laxa in the north, 40 miles below the Arctic Circle. Like most of Iceland’s hundred salmon rivers, the Big Laxa still has a healthy salmon population because it has almost no dams, no industry, no aqua- culture, and few people living along its banks.

SALMON UNDER GLASS

Myriad causes have contributed to the Atlantic salmon‘s decline, including moth repellent dumped in Scottish rivers in the 1970s by tweed manufacturers. The chemical caused spinal deformities in juveniles, like the one prepared for study (left). Such smoking guns are harder to find these days. Iceland’s spawning rivers remain virtually unchanged since the last ice age, yet large numbers of its two-year-old fish are dying at sea. Scientists hope sophisticated data- storage tags (above) that record depth, salinity, and water temperature will provide answers.

One evening in early July, Vigftsson walks across small grass-covered hummocks of lava to the Big Laxd, which is a hundred yards wide and flowing gently toward a wide bay flanked by gray basalt mountains streaked with snow. The tem- perature is 40°F, and as Vigftisson begins cast- ing his two-handed rod, the sun breaks through scattered clouds and floods the landscape with a golden light. A salmon swirls behind Vigftis- son’s fly but fails to strike it on a half dozen sub- sequent casts. It doesn’t matter. Vigfiisson, the 60-year-old chairman of the North Atlantic Salmon Fund, has caught countless salmon in his lifetime, and he is here to participate in a national ritual. In this small country, Atlantic salmon—which, unlike Pacific salmon, can sur- vive after spawning—are as much a part of the national identity as volcanoes.

“For us it is an art form; it is not sport,” says Vigftisson, a short, pug-nosed man with sandy hair and gray-blue eyes. “Maybe it is a kind of patriotism to protect this place.”

Iceland’s salmon rivers are among the best managed in the world. Every river is overseen by an association of owners, many of them farm- ers, who lease fishing rights to clubs, anglers,

and outfitters. The average farmer makes about $10,000 a year from fishing leases, with some earning as much as $70,000. Overall, salmon sportfishing annually pumps 20 million dollars into Iceland’s economy.

It was a recognition of the salmon’s impor- tance to Iceland that led Vigfsson to launch his net buyout campaign in the late 1980s, when salmon were in an alarming free fall through- out the Atlantic. The Canadian government, pressured by the Atlantic Salmon Federation, had already begun the largest buyout of salmon fishermen—a 72-million-dollar (Canadian) effort that retired 7,000 netsmen in the Mari- time Provinces. Vigftisson concentrated suc- cessfully on retiring nets in the Faroe Islands, Iceland, Greenland, and Wales. To date he has raised 20 million dollars, including much of his

Salmon sportfishing pumps 20 million dollars into Iceland annually.

ATLANTIC SALMON 113

own money, to pay fishermen to put down their salmon nets and take up other forms of fishing or change careers.

Now Vigfusson, the son of a commercial fisherman, has set his sights on the remaining salmon netsmen in the Republic of Ireland, northeastern England, and Norway. One of the groups he’d like to put out of business is the Flaherty clan.

illary Harbour is a 12-mile finger of water that extends from the Atlantic Ocean into the verdant hills of Connemara in western Ire- land. Driving along the harbor on a cool, over-

cast afternoon, dodging sheep on the narrow,

winding road, I spy a hand-lettered sign that

| follow a path through a meadow, then come upon the fishing operation of Thomas Flaherty, the 80- year-old patriarch of a family that makes its living netting Atlantic salmon in the harbor and just offshore. Flaherty gra

haired man in yellow oilcloth overalls and a plaid porkpie hat, is sitting on a bluff in a plastic chair, puffing on a cigarette as he scans the gray waters of Killary Harbour. Near an enclosure carved into the bluff are his son John Joseph,

advertises, “Get your wild salmon he;

4, a slende

41, his red-haired grandson, Jason, 13, and two other men. They are practitioners of an old art known as draft netting, which involves spot- ting migrating salmon from a perch above the harbor, then rowing out in a wooden boat to encircle the fish with a net.

Thomas Flaherty and his crew are hospitable and garrulous, serving tea heated in a twig-fired contraption known as a Kelly kettle. Soon I join the men at their lookout, unable to detect the subtle movements across the surface of the harbor that alert them to migrating salmon. Nor can I fathom the meaning of the thickly accented exclamations that pinpoint the loca- tion of the fish. “There he is! Is he over? . .. He’s high. ... Now, go for him!” The younger men scramble down steps cut into the bluff and row hard as the senior Flaherty follows behind and prepares to haul in the net. | spend many hours with the Flahertys over two days, but I bring bad luck; in my presence they land only one salmon. On the second day, as a cold Irish rain blows sideways into their hut, Flaherty laments

the poor fishing: “Great Gawd Almighty in the night! We've been after too many dodgy ones now. Ah, they’re comin very foul today.”

In a typical, 40-day season, the Flahertys usually catch about 1,200 salmon. Another of Flaherty’s five children, 50-year-old Tommy, nets salmon offshore. This is a considerably more productive fishery, accounting for most of the 210,000 Atlantic salmon caught by Irish com mercial fishermen in 2002. Vigftisson figures it will cost at least 50 million dollars to persuade the Irish netsmen to stop, and he plans to raise a third of that himself and wheedle the remain- der out of the Irish government. Many Irish fishermen, battered by steadily shrinking fish- ing seasons and prices driven low by aquacul- ture, say they are ready to bargain with Vigfiisson.

Flaherty, for one, is aware that the netsman’s way of life is as threatened as the salmon.

“They're squeezing us out,” he says as he sizes up the picturesque sweep of Killary Harbour. “If the buyout was good, I would consider it. But I dread to think there’d be a day when no one can come out and do what we've done for hundreds of years. I would hate to see this fishery close down. It would really make me weep.”

ut even if the Flahertys and their cohorts lay down their nets, there is no guarantee that wild Atlantic salmon will recover. After nearly three decades of steadily declining commercial har- vests, the fish have not made a major comeback. Scientists are mystified, although they know that part of the problem is the loss of large numbers of young salmon at sea. But conservationists are ble suspect—aquaculture.

focused on a highly vi “Every place where there is a high concentra- tion of aquaculture, the wild salmon stocks are going down the tubes,” says Bill Taylor, president of the Atlantic Salmon Federation, which ini- tially supported salmon farming because it would ease commercial fishing pressure. Sitting on the far edge of the Isle of Lewis in

Hook-jawed and aggressive, a male salmon in Quebec's St. Jean River fertilizes the eggs of a hidden mate. Rivals of all sizes swarm in soon afterward to do the same, ensuring a deep gene pool. Unlike Pacific species, Atlantic salmon can survive to spawn again.

ATLANTIC SALMON 115

Scotland’s Outer Hebrides is one of the aquacul- ture operations that have reduced the salmon’s complex life cycle to fish pellets and computerized feeding schedules. On a misty morning I board a boat for a trip to one of Scotland’s 350 salmon farms—a cluster of a dozen cages, each 20 yards square, where the world’s third largest salmon- farming company, Fjord Seafood, is growing its product. My guide is Brian Shaw, who is in charge of running five Fjord Seafood sites, each of which produces about 700,000 salmon every other year. Salmon aquaculture now accounts for 40 percent of Scotland’s food exports, more than Highland lamb and beef combined.

As we near the cluster of cages, | hear the background music of salmon farming—the rat- tle of the small brown food pellets being shot through pneumatic pipes and hitting the water like a hard rain. The pewter-colored salmon roil the water as they chase breakfast. On a barge that holds four silos of food, worker Iain Jonah Mac- leod steps inside a shed, glances at a computer, and informs me that the fish in cage A-8 are nearly finished their morning feeding and have devoured 531 of the 976 pounds of pellets they will be allotted that day. The highly efficient farming system can take strains of Atlantic salmon, specially selected for rapid growth, and raise them from fertilized eggs to nine-pound salmon in about two and a half years—twice as fast as in the wild.

“We're producing food here, and it’s a high- density operation,” says Brian Shaw as we stand on a metal walkway between the salmon pens. “All we do is imitate what’s in nature. These fish grow quite well here. They seem quite happy.”

About 60 people work in Shaw’s fish farms, part of the 1,400 workers directly employed in salmon aquaculture in Scotland. (Another 5,000 work in related industries, according to Scottish Quality Salmon, a trade industry group.) That employment is undeniably important to eco- nomically hard-hit areas like the Outer Hebrides. But the advent of mechanized feeding and other efficiencies has meant that aquaculture provides fewer jobs than promised. Indeed, in Scotland, as the production of salmon increased fivefold between 1990 and 2002, the number of workers employed on fish farms actually decreased. At the same time, large corporations have acquired many small salmon farms, reflecting a worldwide trend that has left nearly half of all

It's not easy becoming an Atlantic salmon Only 30 percent of the eggs (top) laid each fall hatch into alevins (right) in early spring. When the food stored in their yolk sacs is gone—after abou

NZelUlare Mimvmaleln) melmcolole mmnale) i Within days they acquire the vertical bars of the parr stage for camouflage, yet only a third survive the year. In the parr’s sec ond or third spring (below), they become smolts and head to sea. Some return as

iW ionm Com-ib ar slelelare Me lai im elelecelanlm-liCclmelalnyg a year in the ocean. Others stay up to five years, doubling in size annually. One egg in 4,000 manages to complete the c

SALMON LIFE CYCLE.

A large female salmon will lay up to

20,000 eggs in one spawning season.

DEEP TRADITIONS

Irishmen have been chasing salmon since mythic hero Finn MacCool ate the Salmon of Knowl- edge from the River Boyne and gained eternal wisdom. Salmon fever afflicts Irish anglers from all walks of life, from Ballina townsmen (above) who pay $40 a year to fish the Moy River, to jet-setting consultant Sam Hay (right, at center), who each year pays $3,000 for a week's fish- ing at Amhuinnsuidhe Castle, a retreat in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides. “These fish are the epit- ome of the wilderness and the sea,” says Hay, toasting guide Kenny Morrison, far right.

salmon aquaculture production in the hands of six multinational companies.

The globalization of salmon aquaculture, cou- pled with serious environmental concerns, has led to growing opposition and calls for reform. A major scourge is sea lice, which can kill fish by grazing on their flesh. In Ireland, Scotland, and Norway studies indicate that sea lice out- breaks at fish farms can have devastating effects on wild salmon and sea trout, a related species.

In western Scotland, where aquaculture is located because of sheltered lochs, wild salmon populations have declined far more dramatically than on the east coast, which has only one fish farm. Similar trends have been found in Ireland. In Norway one study showed that 86 percent of the young salmon migrating out of Sognefjorden —which has many fish farms near its mouth— were covered with lethal levels of lice.

Aquaculture companies are now working to solve the sea lice problem. But what really causes scientists to lose sleep is the continuing escape of massive numbers of farmed salmon. From the earliest years of aquaculture, salmon have escaped whenever seals chewed through pens in search of an easy meal, storms demolished

118 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

cages, or fish were spilled during handling. But now, with 300 million farmed salmon being sold every year, the magnitude of the escape problem is enormous. Ten to 35 percent of the salmon on the spawning grounds of Norwegian rivers are farmed salmon. In Scotland nearly 300,000 farmed fish escaped last year alone.

Detailed studies by Norwegian scientists have shown that wild and farmed fish interbreed. The concern is that a hybrid fish, poorly adapted to life in the wild, will one day spread across the Atlantic. Studies have also found that farmed salmon do not reproduce in the wild nearly as well as native salmon—a phenomenon that, over time, could depress populations. In addition, individual strains of wild salmon have, over thousands of years, adapted to unique conditions in each of 2,600 Atlantic rivers. A genetically homogenous salmon, descended from aquacul- ture fish, could be ill suited to life in many rivers and could also leave the species less able to cope with threats such as disease and climate change.

“The prospect of losing this genetic variabil- ity forever is really frightening,” says Torbjorn Forseth, aquatic research director at the Nor- wegian Institute for Nature Research.

Other problems dog the salmon aquaculture industry: fears that the explosion in farming will lead to the depletion of forage species, like mack- erel, for fish-food pellets; charges—strongly denied by the farmers—that pellets high in diox- ins taint aquaculture salmon; concerns that food and fecal waste from salmon farms have pro- moted toxic algae blooms that have led to clo- sure of shellfishing in nearby waters; and outbreaks of disease around salmon aquacul- ture sites, such as the epidemic of infectious salmon anemia that led to the recent slaughter of 2.1 million tainted fish in Cobscook Bay, the locus of aquaculture in Maine. These cumula- tive problems have recently prompted Norway to establish a network of fjords and wild-salmon rivers where fish farming will be prohibited or restricted.

“We cannot have this rate of expansion in the salmon farming industry and at the same time save wild salmon,” Forseth says. “It’s just too fast.”

One thing is certain: Although it is a struggle to preserve the Atlantic’s remaining wild salmon, it is far more difficult to bring them back from the dead.

Anyone wanting a lesson in the rigors of

salmon resurrection need only visit the ghost rivers of Maine, where a population of several hundred thousand wild salmon has, through three centuries of human abuse, been reduced to a few hundred.

In early November I join biologist Mitchell N. Simpson on the Narraguagus River, one of eight Down East Maine waterways where salmon have been listed under the federal Endangered Species Act. One of 34 rivers that once harbored wild salmon in Maine, the Narraguagus—about 30 miles long—never had a big run, probably around a thousand fish. But the construction of a half dozen mill dams in the 19th century, pollution, and overfishing have nearly wiped out the river’s salmon population. Last year, despite the annual release of about

In Scotland farmed salmon outnumber wild by about 300 to one.

ATLANTIC SALMON 119

Fog and legends shroud eastern Canada’s Restigouche River, where on the evening of June 23, 1990, Ken Jamieson, a retired executive, fought the largest Atlantic salmon ever caught in North America—a 72-pound, 68-inch-long behemoth, which he photographed and released.

200,000 salmon fry into the Narraguagus from government fish hatcheries, only eight returned to the river to spawn.

Simpson is a biologist with the Maine Atlan- tic Salmon Commission, a state agency charged

with studying and restoring salmon populations.

He has come to count the redds where salmon spawn, and we hop in a canoe and paddle five miles downriver. Simpson stands in the stern and scans the cobble for signs of spawning salmon. For nearly two hours, he sees nothing.

“Oh, there we are,” Simpson finally says, pad- dling toward a redd—a patch of stones, ten feet long and four feet wide. It is lighter than the sur- rounding river bottom, as the female salmon, using her tail to dig a hole for her eggs, has swept the cobble clean of dark algae. Pulling out a GPS

device, Simpson jots down the coordinates of the spawning bed, then moves on. By the end of our four-hour trip, we have spotted only a few redds. “We have as many biologists as we do fish,” Simpson says.

State agencies ar Maine’s salmon rivers, and conservation groups like the Atlantic Salmon Federation have launched a major effort to remove dams on the Penobscot River, the state’s largest. But the prob- lem in Maine, as in every other place salmon have disappeared, is that restoring wild runs is akin to bringing a comatose patient back to life Once native salmon stocks disappear, hatchery fish have proved to be ill suited to recolonizing rivers. Along the Connecticut River, federal and state governments have spent a hundred million

continuing the cleanup of

dollars in the past 35 years to clean up the waterway, improve passage for salmon and other fish at dams, and build hatcheries. As many as 9.5 million salmon fry have been released annually into the Connecticut. The result? In 2002, 44 Atlantic salmon returned to spawn. Similar hurdles await those trying to revive salmon populations in the Thames and the Rhine. The fact is, wildness is irreplaceable. Fortunately for the Atlantic salmon, many of the rivers in which it thrives remain far from civ- ilization. Although threatened in its southern range, the Atlantic salmon still has a healthy ref- uge in the far-flung, unpolluted rivers of Que- bec, Labrador, Iceland, northern Norway, and Russia’s Kola Peninsula. The salmon also has proved to be a resilient creature. If commercial

fishing continues to decline, ocean condi- tions don’t deteriorate further, and aquacul- ture is brought under tight control, these northern redoubts of the salmon should serve as the foundation for rebuilding the species.

One such salmon stronghold is the St. Jean River on Quebec’s Gaspé Peninsula. Winding through wooded hills, it is a gentle, limpid stream marked by deep pools of vivid jade. Bill Taylor of the Atlantic Salmon Federation has brought me to the St. Jean to show me one of Canada’s finest salmon rivers, and on a warm, sunny July morning he entrusts me to veteran guide Austin Clark at a pool called Maitland. Seventy-five yards long, it harbors the sleek, undulating shapes of dozens of salmon, which have migrated 19 miles upstream from the sea.

I fish with a two-inch dry fly that skitters across Maitland’s surface. Twice, toward the tail

Find out more about the

Atlantic salmon and its world, read notes from the field, and view more photo: graphs at nationalgeo graphic.com/ngm/0307.

end of the pool, a salmon hits my fly, and twice 1 yank it out of the fish’s mouth. The third time I restrain myself, and an enormous salmon takes off with the fly, leaping repeatedly before hold- ing its ground at the bottom of the pool. Finally I tug it to shore. Clark puts one hand around its fat tail, slips another under its big belly, and places it in a long gray box, where he measures it and takes scale samples. It is a 42- inch, 30-pound female, carrying more than 10,000 eggs. It is the biggest freshwater fish I have ever caught, and as we prepare to release it, | understand why Ted Williams—a fanatical

Atlantic salmon angler—enjoyed catching such a fish as much as hitting a home run. “The Atlantic salmon is a power-packed, leaping, silver thing of beauty,” he once wrote, “and God, I hope it lives forever.”

With both hands Clark steadies the salmon in the cool water. Then it is gone, melting into the green depths of the Maitland pool. 0

END OF THE LINE

A fisherman in a curragh retrieves his only catch of the day in western Ireland, where a traditional fishery has waned along with the salmon. But at least one researcher believes the wild salmon will be back. “Remember,” he says, “they rode out the last ice age.”

ATLANTIC SALMON 123

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PHote By tain Kerr,

PERU, INDIANA

Midair macramé: A dozen sets of arms and legs twine in the Human Pyramid. Adult “riggers”— spotters and equipment handlers whose primary concern is safety—are part of every act too. “The bonds that form among the kids are amaz- ing,” says head trainer Bill Anderson. “When you're 20 or 30 feet in the air, it’s your team- mates’ strength and skill that keep you safe. Trust is a very big deal.”

ois

Find a telephone.

Call the President of the United States and have him “handle that.”

PERU, INDIANA

Practice pays off when a 12-year-old can stroll a spotlit high wire (below) as nimbly as another child might flop on a couch. The acts are authentic circus classics: In 44 years some two dozen Peru performers have gone on to profes- sional circus careers.

For the 2002 grand finale teens soared from tra- pezes three stories above center ring. Coming out of a twisting somersault, a flier reached for her catcher (above). On the ground friends clustered, fingers crossed, breath held (left). Would she make it? Then hands and wrists locked together, and cheering delight roared through the arena. Flowers and proud hugs followed (below). “This

is really just a summer recreation program,” Anderson says modestly. Then he smiles. “But our kids get to do things most kids only dream about.” 0

Find more on 46970 at na tionalgeographic.com/ngm/ 0307. Tell us why we should cover YOUR FAVORITE ZIP CODE at nationalgeographic .com/ngm/zipcode/0307.

ONE THAT ALMOST GOT AWAY

Final Edit

ANIMAL ATTRACTION

Froggy Went A-Courtin’

It’s impossible to know whether this horned frog's cheek-ballooning love song won him a mate, but

it certainly got the attention of the magazine's edi- tors. “The photo stops you, makes you look,” says director of photography Kent Kobersteen. But the competition was stiff—and not just for one frog 000 images from more than 200 photographers for this month’s story on the sex lives of animals. Most

in search of a female. We reviewed some

GEOGRAPHIC stories are shot by one photographer, but for this subject “it was unrealistic,” says Kober steen. “A photographer could spend an entire career and not encounter the number of mating

situations portrayed in this article.”

Cut it or keep it? Find out

more about what tipped the balance for this photo and send it as an electronic greeting card at nationalgeo graphic.com/ngm/0307

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC * JULY 2003

KOREA'S DMZ

Dressed for

Reporting a story with a fully armed escort

MICHAEL MAMASHITA

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC

hat’ s North Korea loom- 3 behind senior writer Tom O'Neill (below) and

U.S. Army Capt. Brian Davis in the Joint Security Area of the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ), the place wh

the opposing sides of a 50-year-old truce come closest to each other. To

JULY 2003

accompany South Korean troops on a pre-dawn border patrol, the pair donned battle-dress uni- forms and daubed their faces with camou flage paint. Cap tain Davis's first order to Tom: “Do not call it makeup!”

Wearing a blue press badge and conspicuously unarmed, Tom drew more than the usual attention from North Koreans on their side of the DM he South Koreans wanted me and {ike Yamashita to be seen,” he says. “They're proud

photographe

that they can bring in the press and show the North Koreans

they have nothing to hide.”

Whenever Tom visited the DMZ, an armed military escort went with him every step. “I felt protected,” he says. “The only fear I felt was in the manic traffic on the way back to Seoul.

Still, he found himself wishing

he could leave

his escort

behind and travel more freely in the rugged—and quite beautiful—border zone. “I kept looking into North Korea and wondering what life was like there,” he recalls. “What do they think? Do they truly hate us? My instinct is to find

out what’s on the other side,

what’s forbidden.”

ON ASSIGNMENT

THREE PEAKS

Howdy, London

s a boy, Joel Sartore wrote to John Wayne five times asking for an auto- graph, and got five different autographed photographs back. “[ still have them,” he says, “though the ink ran on one of them after I hit it with a squirt gun.” So when he stopped in London on his way to photo- graph the three-peak climb in Scotland, England, and Wales, he visited Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum to see the Duke (right). Joel has traveled the world over, but he’d never been to

England before. “I used to hear the food wasn’t good, so I never tried to get assignments there,” he says. Now, assignment in hand, “I stalled in London for a couple of days, being totally out of shape and not really wanting to cover mountain climbers. Madame Tussaud’s was the high point. I liked the statue of Prin- cess Diana, but her rear end was dirty where people had pawed her.” Eventually he made it to the

JOHN TAPPIN three peaks—even reached the top of one. (“There's a train,” he notes.) And British cuisine, which now receives worldwide acclaim? “The ice cream was excellent.”

WORLDWIDE

TEVE ANDERSON

Rolling in a “German wheel” at the Peru, Indiana, circus made photographer David Yoder feel as if he was in a front-loading wash- ing machine. “| tried the easiest trick: rolling around in a circle,” says David. “It was disorienting, but if you shift your body weight

a certain way, you can keep the momentum going. After ten min- utes, | was sore in places | never knew | had muscles.” David makes his home in Italy, but he was born in Fort Wayne, Indiana, about 85 miles from Peru. “A pho- tographer dreams of visiting exotic places for National GeoGraPHic. My first assignment took me right back to where | grew up,” he says.

NATIONAL GEOG

For this month’s article on Atlantic salmon, writer Fen Montaigne had a tough assignment: Spend

a couple of months visiting the most beautiful places in the Northern Hemisphere. “Salmon rivers happen to be located in gorgeous landscapes,” he says with a grin. “These fish only flour- ish in unspoiled places. They tend to disappear wherever there's too much interference from human- ity.” An avid fly fisherman, Fen took his fishing gear with him and managed to get in some angling in Iceland and Quebec. The burden of research, you understand.

Even experts get fooled by the reproductions of Shang era bronzes made at the Xinxiang City Museum. In preparation for his article on ancient China, Peter Hessler (right, at right) went there with photographer Lou Mazzatenta and watched skilled technician Wang Xuemei create a mold for

a Bronze Age bowl, working

from a photo on the table. Peter has lived in China for six years, speaks Mandarin proficiently, and

RAPHIC + JULY 2003

as Lou notes, “moves in and out of Chinese society easily.” That made Lou a little nervous: “Peter eats at tiny, local restaurants where the waiters don't speak English and his bill was about 50 cents per dinner; | ate in hotels, where meals cost a lot more.

| was afraid the accountants at National GEOGRAPHIC Would compare our expenses and accuse me of overspending.”

Find more stories from our authors and photographers, including their best, worst, and quirkiest experiences, at nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0307.

5

i am stronger than diabetes’

w= i _ ke,

FOR PEOPLE WITH TYPE 2 DIABETES Avand la rosiglitazone maleate “Every big hug makes me glad I take care of my diabetes.”

“My granddaughter sure knows how to make my day. Her face lights up when she sees me. Then, she dishes out those hugs— and that's what really makes me want to take care of my diabetes.

“I've got my routine down: | stay active, and try my best to eat healthier meals. To help me stay on track, my doctor added Avandia. It makes my body more responsive to its own natural insulin, so | can control my blood sugar more effectively.

“| started on Avandia over a year ago, and while not everyone gets the same results, my blood sugar has never been better. | know Avandia is helping me to be stronger than diabetes. That's something | can really wrap my arms around.”

Avandia, along with diet and exercise, helps improve blood sugar control. It may be prescribed alone, with metformin, sulfonylureas, or insulin. When taking Avandia with sulfonylureas or insulin, patients may be at increased risk for low blood sugar. Ask your doctor whether you need to lower your sulfonylurea or insulin dose.

Some people may experience tiredness, weight gain or swelling with Avandia.

Avandia may cause fluid retention or swelling which could lead to or worsen heart failure, so you should tell your doctor if you have a history of these conditions. If you experience an unusually rapid increase in weight, swelling or shortness of breath while taking Avandia, talk to your doctor immediately. In combination with insulin Avandia may increase the risk of other heart problems. Ask your doctor about important symptoms and if the combination continues to work for you. Avandia is not for everyone. Avandia is not recommended for patients with severe heart failure or active liver disease.

Also, blood tests to check for serious liver problems should be conducted before and during therapy. Tell your doctor if you have liver disease, or if you experience unexplained tiredness, stomach problems, dark urine or yellowing of skin while taking Avandia.

If you are nursing, pregnant or thinking about becoming pregnant, or premenopausal and not ovulating, talk to your doctor before taking Avandia.

See important patient information on the adjacent page.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL 1-800-AVANDIA (1-800-282-6342) OR VISIT WWW.AVANDIA.COM

AVANDIA®. HELP USE THE NATURAL INSULIN IN YOU.°

ASK YOUR HEALTHCARE PROFESSIONAL ABOUT

7 NY | ane | f=)

Patient Information about AVANDIA® (rosiglitazone maleate) 2 mg, 4 mg, and 8 mg Tablets

What is Avandia?

Avandia is one product in a class of prescription drugs called thiazolidinediones (thigh-a-zol-a~deen-die-owns) or TZDs. It is used to treat type 2 diabetes by helping the body use the insulin that it is already making. Avandia comes as pills that can be taken either once a day or twice a day to help improve blood sugar levels.

How does Avandia treat type 2 diabetes?

If you have type 2 diabetes, your body probably still produces insulin but it is not able to use the insulin effi- ciently. Insulin is needed to allow sugar to be carried from the bloodstream into many cells of the body for energy. If insulin is not being used correctly, sugar does not enter the cells very well and builds up in the blood. If not controlled, the high blood sugar level can lead to serious medical problems, including kidney damage, blindness and amputation.

Avandia helps your body use insulin by making the cells more sensitive to insulin so that the sugar can enter the cell.

How quickly will Avandia begin to work?

Avandia begins to reduce blood sugar levels within 2 weeks. However, since Avandia works to address an important underlying cause of type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance, it may take 8 to 12 weeks to see the full effect. If you do not respond adequately to your starting dose of Avandia, your physician may increase your daily dose to improve your blood sugar control.

How should | take Avandia?

Your doctor may tell you to take Avandia once a day or twice a day (in the morning and evening). It can be taken with or without meals. Food does not affect how Avandia works. To help you remember to take Avandia, you may want to take it at the same time every day.

What if | miss a dose? hi If if Avandii in rn

¢ As soon as you remember your missed dose, take one tablet anytime during the day.

IL your doctor has prescribed Avandia for use twice a day:

¢ As soon as you remember the missed dose, take one tablet.

¢ Take the next dose at the normal time on the same day.

¢ You should never take three doses on any single day in order to make up for a missed dose the day before.

Do | need to test my blood for sugar while using Avandia?

Yes, you should follow your doctor's instructions about your at-home testing schedule.

Does Avandia cure type 2 diabetes?

Currently there is no cure for diabetes. The only way to reduce the effects of the disease is to maintain good blood sugar control by following your doctor's advice for diet, exercise, weight control, and medication. Avandia, alone or in combination with other antidiabetic drugs (i.e., sulfonylureas, metformin, or insulin), may improve these other efforts by helping your body make better use of the insulin it already produces.

Can | take Avandia with other medications? Avandia has been taken safely by people using other medications, including other antidiabetic medications,

birth control pills, warfarin (a blood thinner), Zantac® (ranitidine, an antiulcer product from GlaxoSmithKline), certain heart medications, and some cholesterol-lower- ing products. You should discuss with your doctor the most appropriate plan for you. If you are taking pre- scription or over-the-counter products for your diabetes or for conditions other than diabetes, be sure to tell your doctor. Sometimes a patient who is taking two antidia- betic medications each day can become irritable, light- headed or excessively tired. Tell your doctor if this occurs; your blood sugar levels may be dropping too low, and the dose of your medication may need to be reduced.

What are the possible side effects of Avandia? Avandia was generally well tolerated in clinical trials. The most common side effects reported by people tak- ing Avandia were upper respiratory infection (cold-like symptoms) and headache. When taking Avandia with sulfonylureas or insulin, patients may be at increased risk for low blood sugar. Ask your doctor whether you need to lower your sulfonylurea or insulin dose.

Some people may experience tiredness, weight gain, or swelling with Avandia.

Avandia may cause fluid retention or swelling which could lead to or worsen heart failure, so you should tell your doctor if you have a history of these conditions. If you experience an unusually rapid increase in weight, swelling or shortness of breath while taking Avandia, talk to your doctor immediately. In combination with insulin, Avandia may increase the risk of other heart problems. Ask your doctor about important symptoms and if the combination continues to work for you. Avandia is not for everyone. Avandia is not recommended for patients with severe heart failure or active liver disease.

Also, blood tests to check for serious liver problems should be conducted before and during therapy. Tell your doctor if you have liver disease, or if you experi- ence unexplained tiredness, stomach problems, dark urine or yellowing of skin while taking Avandia.

If you are nursing, pregnant or thinking about becom- ing pregnant, or premenopausal and not ovulating, talk to your doctor before taking Avandia, as Avandia may increase your chance of becoming pregnant.

Who should not use Avandia?

You should not take Avandia if you are in the later stages of heart failure or if you have active liver disease. The following people should also not take Avandia: People with type 1 diabetes, people who experienced yellow- ing of the skin with Rezulin® (troglitazone, Parke-Davis), people who are allergic to Avandia or any of its com- ponents and people with diabetic ketoacidosis.

Why are laboratory tests recommended?

Your doctor may conduct blood tests to measure your blood sugar control. Blood tests to check for serious liver problems should be conducted before starting Avandia, every 2 months during the first year, and periodically thereafter.

It is important that you call your doctor immediately if you experience unexplained symptoms of nausea, vom- iting, stomach pain, tiredness, anorexia, dark urine, or yellowing of the skin,

How should | store Avandia?

Avandia should be stored at room temperature in a childproof container out of the reach of children. Store Avandia in its original container.

@ ciarosmitnkiine

advertiser.connections

Get more information from our advertising partners about the products and services they advertise in NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC magazine. Remember, our advertisers help make possible the Society’s mission of education, exploration, and research. To find out more, point and click to the following URLs:

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ashback

Changing Sides

Korea wasn’t yet split in two when its former minister of war, Yun Ung-ryeol, center, was photographed with his family around 1910—the same year Japan began its 35-year occupation of the country. But political upheaval still divided the nation, and would soon tear the Yun family apart.

Ung-ryeol’s son Yun Chi-ho, standing, became an advocate of Korean sovereignty. After being arrested by the Japanese on false charges in 1911 and serving four hard years in prison, he chose to remain silent on the subject of foreign rule. Then in the late 1930s Yun Chi-ho was persuaded—some say coerced—to make speeches praising Tokyo’s leadership, even as its grip tightened on Korea before World War Il. Now many remember the once fer- vent nationalist as a collaborator.

UNDERWOOD & UNDERWOOD

WEBSITE EXCLUSIVE

You can send this month's Flashback as an electronic greeting card and access the Flashback photo archives at nationalgeographic.com/ ngm/flashback/0307.

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC (ISSN 0027. ISUSHED MONTHLY 8Y THE NANONAL POSTAGE AND HANDLING), PERIODICALS POSTAGE PAIO AT WASHINGTON, DC, AND

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